Puppet Masters

Austrian Chancellor Kurz steps down over corruption allegations, denies wrongdoing

MSN
Sun, 10 Oct 2021 10:28 UTC

Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz resigned after pressure over accusation in a corruption scandal.

Kurz, 35, who denied any wrongdoing was under fire from his own coalition partner the Greens. Kurz said he wanted to "end the stalemate to prevent chaos" as he stepped down from office.

The outgoing Chancellor put forward the name of foreign minister Alexander Schallenberg as the new head which the Greens said was the "right step for future government work".

Comment: Considering the rampant corruption in politics these days, it's often rather revealing which people the establishment attacks and those whose actual criminality is allowed to continue unchallenged:

Fake, Woke & Authoritarian: Why Does Canada Continue to Take The Insultingly Insincere Justin Trudeau Seriously?

Eva Bartlett
RT
Sat, 09 Oct 2021 16:18 UTC

Canada's pointless prime minister is a vacuous, self-aggrandising, borderline despot incapable of even keeping up the pretence he cares a jot about the people unfortunate enough to be governed by the privileged charlatan.

Just weeks post federal elections, the muppet PM of Canada, Justin Trudeau, has given up all pretense of being a serious politician and instead returned to his norm of idiocy, offensive gaffs, scandals, and increasing the authoritarianism Canadians have endured the past 18+ months (but which Trudeau and other leaders have flouted).

On September 30, the day of Canada's newly-established National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, instead of himself abiding by the words of his (clearly-scripted and hollow) statement, Trudeau skipped off West to hit the waves and walk on the beach with his wife and kids.

Comment: Yes, sadly indeed!

'Peaceful reunification with Taiwan will be realised' - Xi Jinping

Hon Kong Free Press
Sat, 09 Oct 2021 19:43 UTC

China's President Xi Jinping said Saturday "peaceful reunification" with Taiwan "will be and can be realised", days after Chinese warplanes made record incursions into the air defence zone of the democratically ruled island.

Self-governed Taiwan, which has never formally declared independence, lives under the constant threat of invasion by China, which views the island as its territory and has vowed to one day seize it, by force if necessary.

"Realising national reunification by peaceful means best serves the interests of the nation as a whole including our brethren in Taiwan," Xi said in a speech marking the 110th anniversary of a revolution that ended millennia of imperial rule and led to the founding of the Republic of China.

Comment: US special operations are operating in Taiwan, Britain sailed a warship through the Taiwan Strait, but China, that actually shares a history with Taiwan, is the threat?

Absurd mission creep: The CIA's new units pave the way for the most totalitarian period in its history

RT
Fri, 08 Oct 2021 15:15 UTC

With new units on China and climate change, global health and emerging tech, the CIA is expanding its reach (as it has often tried to do, unsuccessfully, in the past). But these ventures are likely to have unwanted consequences.

The CIA recently announced a reorganization that includes the creation of two new 'mission centers', one focusing exclusively on China while the other - called the Transnational and Technology Mission Center - will look at emerging technologies, climate change, and global health.

Both of these new units pose baffling questions. You might wonder why it has taken so long for the CIA to set up a dedicated China unit, given the long-term increases in the country's economic, military and geopolitical power.

Comment: With the manufactured coronavirus crisis Western governments have achieved power grabs that, otherwise, would have been near impossible:

And check out SOTT radio's: NewsReal: The Great (End)Game - Closing the Afghan War, Opening the 'Covid War'?

Rand Paul's warning to Americans: 'Be afraid of your government'

Matt Margolis
PJ Media
Thu, 07 Oct 2021 11:51 UTC

In the wake of Attorney General Merrick Garland's announcement that he plans to sic the FBI on concerned parents who speak out at school board meetings against critical race theory and COVID restrictions, Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) blasted the Biden administration and said Americans should "be afraid of your government."

Paul told Fox News:

"Moms at school boards are being told that they're criminals, potential domestic terrorists, for the crime of dissent, and I think criminalizing dissent is something that we should all be appalled with,"

Garland claimed that there has been a "disturbing trend" of teachers being threatened or harassed. PJ Media's Megan Fox looked into these allegations and concluded they're mostly bunk.

Comment: '1984' in 2021.

'Polexit': Will Poland's 'nuclear strike' on EU's legal order lead to the country quitting the bloc?

Sandrine Amiel, Christopher Pitchers
euronews
Sun, 10 Oct 2021 19:36 UTC

In a decision that sent shockwaves through Europe, Poland's constitutional court on Thursday ruled the country's laws had supremacy of those of the European Union. The long-awaited ruling says some parts of EU treaties and court rulings go against Poland's highest law.

Jakub Jaraczewski, research coordinator at Democracy Reporting, called the move a

"massive escalation of the crisis of the rule of law in Poland. This is unprecedented. We have an EU member state basically stating that the primacy of EU law, one of the core ideas of the European Union common legal order, is partially not effective in Poland. This has not happened before."

Laurent Pech, professor of European law at Middlesex University, compared the ruling to a

"nuclear strike on the EU legal order. As soon as the judgment is going to be published, Polish judges are going to have to choose between violating EU laws or disobeying the constitution. So if they do not violate EU laws, because they have a duty to apply EU rule of law standards under the treaties, then they are going to face disciplinary proceedings and possibly also criminal proceedings."

The Polish verdict drew strong condemnation from the EU's executive and the main parties in the European Parliament. The European Commission said the ruling "raised serious concerns" and suggested that Warsaw could expect a strong response from Brussels.

Comment: It seems like a lot of cooks are stirring the pot before justice is served.

See also:

Hungary: Orban backs Polish court ruling challenging EU law

Krisztina Than, Mike Harrison
OAN
Sat, 09 Oct 2021 00:00 UTC

Hungary has called on European Union institutions "to respect member states' sovereignty" after it backed a Polish court ruling that some EU law is incompatible with the Polish constitution.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban signed a Hungarian government decree on Saturday, his press chief told state news agency MTI, welcoming the ruling by Poland's Constitutional Court which has plunged the EU into an existential crisis.

Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said she was "deeply concerned" by the ruling and that the Commission would do all in its power to ensure the primacy of EU law.

Right-wing populist governments in Poland and Hungary have been at odds with the Commission over issues ranging from media freedoms, migration, LGBT rights to judicial independence. The two former communist states, which joined the EU in 2004, have been allies within the bloc, often voting in tandem, and supporting each other's case.

What governments got wrong about the global energy transition

Tsvetana Paraskova
OilPrice.com
Thu, 07 Oct 2021 05:00 UTC

There are many hard lessons to be learned from the current energy crisis in Europe, including the importance of both flexibility and backup options for an energy grid
While the concept of an energy transition has been fully embraced by governments and institutions around the world, it seems the logistics of such a transition has been ignored
In order to take back control of an energy transition that has evidently spun out of control, policymakers must manage the decline of the current system as well as the creation of a new one

The energy crisis in Europe exposed the complexity of a transition to green energy: it is not happening overnight, and it cannot be done successfully with the old tricks. Energy systems, markets, and grids globally need fundamental changes to legislation, regulation, and oversight in order to accommodate 100-percent zero-emission sources. And even in that case, power systems need flexibility and backups in order to avert similar crises down the road as many parts of the world commit to net-zero emissions by 2050 or 2060.

The current crisis in the UK is a cautionary tale about how not to rush to green energy, Rochelle Toplensky of The Wall Street Journal notes.

Comment: It is not only a disorderly mess, it is a train wreck without recourse once all traditional sources lay fallow and the demand for any available energy remains off the chart and unfulfilled. Given the effects of solar minimum cycle and foreseeable earth changes, purposing a diminished, unaffordable energy supply is just insane.

See also:
Energy crisis may unleash winter blackouts across US, insider warns

Taliban 'will not work with US to contain Islamic State'

Kathy Gannon, Ellen Knickmeyer
Independent.ie
Sat, 09 Oct 2021 10:15 UTC

The Taliban have ruled out cooperation with the US to contain extremist groups in Afghanistan. The group has staked out its uncompromising position on a key issue ahead of the first direct talks between the former foes since America withdrew from the country in August. Senior Taliban officials and US representatives are to meet over Saturday and Sunday in Doha, the capital of the Persian Gulf state of Qatar.

Officials from both sides have said issues to be tackled include reining in extremist groups and the evacuation of foreign citizens and Afghans from the country. The Taliban have signaled their flexibility on evacuations.

Taliban political spokesman Suhail Shaheen told The Associated Press there would be no cooperation with Washington on going after the increasingly active Islamic State (IS) group affiliate in Afghanistan.

Capitol Police whistleblower delivers scathing rebuke to two of its senior leaders on Jan. 6

Daniel Lippman and Betsy Woodruff Swan
Yahoo! News
Fri, 08 Oct 2021 19:15 UTC

© AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File
Jan. 6, 2021, protesters confront U.S. Capitol Police officers outside the Capitol in Washington.

A former high-ranking Capitol Police official with knowledge of the department's response to the Jan. 6 attack has sent congressional leaders a scathing letter accusing two of its senior leaders of mishandling intelligence and failing to respond properly during the riot.

The whistleblower, who requested anonymity for privacy reasons and left the force months after the attack, sent the 16-page letter late last month to the top members of both parties in the House and Senate. His missive makes scorching allegations against Sean Gallagher, the Capitol Police's acting chief of uniformed operations, and Yogananda Pittman, its assistant chief of police for protective and intelligence operations — who also served as its former acting chief.

The whistleblower accuses Gallagher and Pittman of deliberately choosing not to help officers under attack on Jan. 6 and alleges that Pittman lied to Congress about an intelligence report Capitol Police received before that day's riot. After a lengthy career in the department, the whistleblower was a senior official on duty on Jan. 6.

Comment: "Stop the Steal" began as a grass-roots movement of Trump supporters who could see that was something very wrong about the 2020 election. It was ripe for social media suppression and FBI infiltration

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Bezel Bub

Puppet Masters

Austrian Chancellor Kurz steps down over corruption allegations, denies wrongdoing

Fake, Woke & Authoritarian: Why Does Canada Continue to Take The Insultingly Insincere Justin Trudeau Seriously?

'Peaceful reunification with Taiwan will be realised' - Xi Jinping

Absurd mission creep: The CIA's new units pave the way for the most totalitarian period in its history

Rand Paul's warning to Americans: 'Be afraid of your government'

'Polexit': Will Poland's 'nuclear strike' on EU's legal order lead to the country quitting the bloc?

Hungary: Orban backs Polish court ruling challenging EU law

What governments got wrong about the global energy transition

Taliban 'will not work with US to contain Islamic State'

Capitol Police whistleblower delivers scathing rebuke to two of its senior leaders on Jan. 6

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