Events in the world of "high politics" over the last week have been very revealing, and entertaining. The US-Israel 'special relationship' has, apparently, been souring for a while.

At the beginning of this year Israeli defence minister Moshe Yaalon accused John Kerry of being "obsessive and messianic" in his pursuit of a peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians. A few months later Kerry warned Israel that it was in danger of becoming "an apartheid state". Israel is, of course, already a full-blown apartheid state with even the warmongering daughter of Israeli terrorists and now, Israeli Justice Minister, Tzipi Livni, complaining about segregated buses for Palestinians.

Two weeks ago the Obama administration warned that Israel risked alienating its "closest allies", and last week Yaalon was pointedly snubbed by senior administration officials during a visit to Washington. Then, several days ago, American-Israeli journalist and former Israeli prison guard, Jeffrey Goldberg, published an article in The Atlantic that cited an unnamed Obama official describing Netanyahu as a "chickenshit" in terms of the moribund Israel-Palestine 'peace process' and the alleged 'nuclear threat' from Iran.

As Russia continues to assert itself and lay claim to its rightful place as a leading global power, Western governments and their media whores, in a desperate attempt to preserve their faltering hegemony, are resorting to increasingly outrageous anti-Russian stunts and manipulations that surpass even the worst propaganda of the Cold War era.

The most recent episode in the ongoing absurd anti-Russian theater occurred 10 days ago when the Swedish Svenska Dagbladet paper declared that the Swedish military had "intercepted a distress call in Russian on a radio frequency reportedly used by Russia for emergency calls" off the Swedish coast.

Citing unnamed "sources" the newspaper claimed that the call was "encrypted radio traffic between a location outside of Stockholm and Russia's Baltic enclave, Kaliningrad" and that it "indicated a damaged Russian submarine."

Welcome to the official radio show of Sott.net, your source for independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events. Each week, Sott.net editors Joe Quinn and Niall Bradley analyze global impact events that shape our world and future, and connect the dots to reveal the bigger picture obscured by mainstream programming.

From the crisis in Ukraine to the ISIS in Iraq, from increasingly extreme weather to surviving in a world ruled by psychopaths, your hosts, their colleagues (and occasional guests) explore the deeper truths driving world events by exposing the manipulations behind what passes for 'news'.

Live every Sunday from 2-4pm EST / 11am-1pm PST / 8-10pm CET, SOTT Talk Radio is the one and only radio show for Seekers of Truth.

Running Time: 02:02:00

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At what point do we start getting suspicious?

Three weeks ago, on October 3rd, Canadian PM Stephen Harper's Conservative party narrowly passed a motion to "launch combat missions" in Iraq alongside other Western warmongering nations and their clients in the Middle East. The motion was passed (157 for to134 against) despite stiff opposition from the NDP and Liberal opposition parties and a Canadian public traditionally averse to any kind of foreign military campaigns. On the day of the vote, an online poll showed almost 60% of respondents were against Canada joining the 'coalition'.

NDP opposition leader Tom Mulcair said that the Harper government was "plunging Canada into a prolonged war without a credible plan" and that bombing ISIS "will only create more recruits for ISIS and can, in fact, prove to be disastrously counterproductive". On Monday, former prime minister Jean Chretien again criticized Canada's military involvement in Iraq saying that it was "just the latest in a long history of interventions by western countries that have left "scars" on the Middle East" and that "Canada should be putting its emphasis on humanitarian assistance for the refugees in the region."

The pusillanimous PM Harper responded by reading a gospel from the Neocon book of public scaremongering:

"It is imperative that we act with our allies to halt ISIL's spread in the region and reduce its capacity to launch terrorist attacks outside the region, including against Canada. As a Government, we know our ultimate responsibility is to protect Canadians, and to defend our citizens from those who would do harm to us and to our families.

In urging all parliament members to support the motion, Harper admitted that involving Canada in another war was not only unpopular but politically risky in the run up to next year's general election. Then again, given the widespread allegations of vote fraud leveled against Harper's Conservative party during the last general election, Harper may not have much to worry about.

Two days ago, having finally emerged from the broom closet into which he bolted during the gunfire in the Parliament building, Harper responded to the two "terror attacks" saying that the events were "a grim reminder that Canada is not immune to the types of terrorist attacks we have seen elsewhere around the world, and that the attack(s) would only strengthen Canada's response to terrorist organizations". Harper also pledged to speed up a plan already under way to bolster Canadian laws and police powers in the areas of "surveillance, detention and arrest. We will not be intimidated. Canada will never be intimidated."

But of course, as a result of two very well timed 'terror attacks', Canada, or rather Canada's public, its military and its political class, have been intimidated (or rather manipulated) into backing down in the face of Harper's warmongering and becoming accomplices in more corporate war-for-profit and the destruction of their civil liberties.

In Ottawa today, in an event "unprecedented in Canada's history", someone shot dead - at point blank range - one of the two soldiers who stand guard at Canada's National War Memorial. From there the suspect(s) hijacked car(s) and made their way to Parliament Buildings, where they opened fire in close proximity to Canadian government ministers and legislators. Canada's capital city is currently on lockdown as thousands of personnel from multiple security forces patrol the area and set up checkpoints to monitor vehicles going in and out of the city.

One of the shooters has been killed, allegedly by a security guard inside the Parliament. At least two patients have turned up with gunshot wounds at a local hospital. Eyewitnesses told local news outlet CTV that "a man with long hair carrying a rifle" fired four shots at a soldier next to Canada's 'Tomb of the Unknown Soldier'. That soldier has since died.

Eyewitness: 'It sounded like a shotgun'

One man watched the scene unfold from a third-floor office that faces the war memorial. "It was unreal," said the witness, who asked not to be identified. "I heard the shot and looked out the window. . . The shooter came from the west side and aimed right at the young guy that was standing guard and shot him twice. I think he missed with the first shot; it sounded like a shotgun."

Canada's military has been put on high alert, with all its bases on lockdown. Canada had incidentally raised its national terrorism alert level earlier today, following a separate attack on Monday, in which two Canadian soldiers were run over in a hit-and-run by a "homegrown radicalized jihadist", Quebecois Martin Couture-Rouleau, aka 'Ahmad the Converted'. One of the soldiers died. The suspect was summarily executed following a manhunt by militarized police.

Welcome to the official radio show of Sott.net, your source for independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events. Each week, Sott.net editors Joe Quinn and Niall Bradley analyze global impact events that shape our world and future, and connect the dots to reveal the bigger picture obscured by mainstream programming.

From the crisis in Ukraine to the ISIS in Iraq, from increasingly extreme weather to surviving in a world ruled by psychopaths, your hosts, their colleagues (and occasional guests) explore the deeper truths driving world events by exposing the manipulations behind what passes for 'news'.

Live every Sunday from 2-4pm EST / 11am-1pm PST / 8-10pm CET, SOTT Talk Radio is the one and only radio show for Seekers of Truth.

Running Time: 02:07:00

Download: MP3

This week on SOTT Talk Radio: is the increasing Ebola hysteria justified? Is it safer to be paranoid? Or is the scare blown out of proportion? We also looked into historical cases of real devastating outbreaks to see what can and does happen from time to time: outbreaks with mortality rates of up to 90+%.

Is US Senator John McCain fit for public office? Because he's been making some real weird statements of late, mostly to do with the ISIS islama-terra boogeymen. It's not just people behaving strangely of late. What is going on in the animal kingdom? Pets attacking owners in every US state; elephants attacking villages in India; hyenas attacking people in Africa; and bears attacking people in Canada and Russia.

All this and more in this week's Connecting the Dots:

Running Time: 01:57:00

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Our readers may agree with us when we say that reality can be fairly depressing, to say the least! Sometimes it reaches a point where things get so bad, people must find all sorts of ways to deal with it. Some may choose to shut down and find a means of escape and distract themselves by dissociating. Others may feel numb and desensitized. Others may fall into a deep depression, while others may not have cared from the beginning. And yet, despite the grim global picture, some continue speaking up (like we do here on SOTT). If the world wasn't governed by psychopaths, this could be a wonderful place, couldn't it?

There are several ways to speak up and we believe that now it is the time to do it! One can share facts and expose lies in a serious manner. One can also simply share his or her opinion via the social networks. One can show indignation or righteous anger, where it belongs and in many different ways.

Well, this time we have decided to use yet another tactic to counteract lies and propaganda: Humor! We selected a song that many of you may know, from The Sound of Music. As you will see, the lyrics have been modified slightly, and it's not about Maria, but about one of the main perpetrators of crime and suffering in the world. Despite having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, full of empty promises of "Hope" and "Change", this character manipulated the masses and destroyed his own and other countries in the typical American way. He was probably put in power for that purpose. But his smile doesn't fool many people any more. Have you guessed who this song is about yet? You probably have.

So, plug in your microphone, and sing along! The lyrics are available in the video for you to be able to join in. Let your voice be heard by many, and share it around!

When the first ISIS 'beheading' video was released I was immediately struck by how utterly counter-productive it was for the 'Islamic State' to produce a glossy, high-definition video of the event and make it available to Western audiences. If the goal of such a dubious PR campaign was to intimidate the anglo-American Empire into backing off from attacking the alleged Levantine 'rebels', then it failed miserably.

What's most amazing however is that the IS leadership were unable to foresee that lopping the heads off US and UK citizens and producing a made for TV video of the gruesome spectacle would simply gift the anglo-American Empire builders with the justification to launch a bombing campaign against the video makers. I mean, how politically ignorant do you have to be to not realise that? Did they learn nothing from the 9/11 attacks? Western civilian casualties are the US military industrial complex's bread and butter! They use Western civilian casualties of Arab terrorism to justify the invasion and occupation of the Arab countries that the erstwhile Arab terrorists are trying to rid of US occupation!

Even the kids in the schoolyard know it's a bad idea to kick the bully in the shins, he'll just turn around and knock your head off. It's definitely an unequal exchange. So why would anyone in their right mind pursue such a strategy? I'm assuming that the leaders of ISIL are 'in their right minds' because they've shown themselves perspicacious and able enough to mount a successful blitzkrieg through northern Iraq. You don't do that without being somewhat proficient in military strategy. Seems to me we need to look for an alternative narrative about what the role of ISIL really is.

'Iraq War III' is underway, and Mother Nature is not happy about it.

Fireball meteor sightings picked up dramatically in September, with spectacular sightings over Russia, the U.S. Pacific coast, an actual impact next to a busy airport in Nicaragua, and what appeared to be multiple fireballs coming down over Lake Michigan. The U.S.'s earliest ever snowfall hit South Dakota, Wyoming, and Colorado, while Calgary in Canada went from summer temperatures to 11 inches of snow overnight. Ignoring the raging wildfires across California, a monster hailstorm blanketed Napa Valley with 6 inches of hail, a feat repeated in Florence, Italy and Teruel, Spain.

Rainfall records around the world continue to be broken at an alarming rate, with deluges happening so fast in southern France, southern Italy, the Balkans and southern Spain that cars, roads, homes and people were washed away. Montpelier even recorded over a foot of rain in just two hours. Intense flooding in India, Pakistan, Thailand and China were matched by successive waves of flash-flooding from Mexico to the U.S. Northeast, with up to 10 inches of rain falling from coast to coast. Meanwhile, tornadoes made appearances in France, Germany, The Netherlands and Croatia.

There were a number of spectacular volcanic eruptions, particularly in Papua New Guinea, Iceland and Japan: the latter two countries' second-largest volcanoes erupted; the first gave plenty of warning but Mount Ontake took hundreds of climbers completely by surprise. September also saw a lot of 'high strangeness', with 'UFO lights' filmed over Hong Kong at the height of anti-Chinese protests, and plasma formations photographed above Chicago. In what could be a foreboding harbinger of plagues to come, the West African Ebola outbreak death toll passed the 3,000 mark last month... as the deadly virus reached the U.S.

These were the Signs of the Times in September 2014: