CNBC Uses Daft Economic "Logic" To Spred Anti-Venezuelan Propaganda
This anti-Venzuela propaganda segment by CNBC doesn't even get basic economics right:
For many countries, cheaper oil is helping boost economic growth. But if you're a struggling Caribbean nation dependent on energy subsidies from Venezuela, the crash in oil prices is not welcome news.
...
[The fall in oil prices] has also jeopardized generous financing terms extended to more than a dozen Caribbean nations that rely on Venezuelan oil to fuel their own economies.Venezuela launched the so-called Petrocaribe accord in 2005 as it sought to become a low-cost energy provider and win political favor among small island economies heavily reliant on oil imports. But as oil prices have fallen, Venezuela's energy blessing has turned to something of a curse.
...
Under the terms of the Petrocaribe agreement, the drop in oil prices has—paradoxically—raised members' oil import costs. That's because, as crude prices fall, they lose access to extremely generous financing terms that amount to subsidies.When oil was over $100 a barrel, Petrocaribe member countries paid just 40 percent of the upfront costs, and Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA, covered the rest of the expense with a low interest rate loan payable over 25 years. Some have also paid their oil bills with bartered agricultural products or services.
The extra cash from deferred payments helped some countries finance infrastructure projects and other spending programs.
But those finance terms become much less generous as the price of oil falls, forcing member countries to pay more upfront, with payment in full when prices fall below $40 a barrel, according to RBC economist Marla Dukharan.
Lets unwrap that with an example.
When oil was at $100 per barrel the Caribbean countries paid $40 in cash plus $60 in deferred payments which were spread over 25 years.
When oil is at $50 per barrel the Caribbean countries pay $40 in cash plus $10 in deferred payments which are spread over 25 years. The money they will owe to Venezuela and will have to pay is less than it was at higher oil prices. That is certainly very good for them.
Now how is that "not welcome news"?
How has that "jeopardized generous financing terms"?
How has that "turned to something of a curse"?
How are they now to "lose access to extremely generous financing terms"?
Venezuela did not simply hand out money. It granted vendor loans bound to the purchase of its product. Not having to take out additional loans because the product is cheaper now is not losing "extremely generous financing terms" because those terms were never available for anything else.
It is unclear from the piece how the financial amateurs at CNBC got their crazy ideas and claims.
They provide a link to the RBC "analysis", written in November, which says:
PetroCaribe member countries "pay 40 per cent upfront when the price is over US$100 per barrel; 50 per cent upfront when the price is between US$80-100 per barrel; 60 per cent upfront when the price is between US$50-80 per barrel; and full payment upfront when the price is below US$50 per barrel.
So its full payment starting at $50/bl and CNBC got it wrong when it wrote "with payment in full when prices fall below $40 a barrel". The CNBC writers are obviously unable to correctly copy from the sources they linked to.
Now looking at the RBC numbers CNBC was unable to copy and paste some economically ignorant people, like those CNBC folks, might argue that the $40 upfront at above $100/bl is less than the $50 upfront at a $50/bl price. But at a price of $40/bl the cash payment would be again the same as at $100/bl. To argue from one extreme price-point when there are ranges is wrong. But that $50 cash versus $40 cash argument is also incorrect as the $40 at a $100/bl price is not the total payment. When one includes the cost to pay off a $60 per barrel loan including the interest at a $100/bl price the $10/bl additional cash payment at $50/bl will be a lot cheaper.
At the end of the CNBC piece we get to know who likely came up with the whole stupid argumentation (and also why):
With the future of Venezuelan oil sales in doubt, the White House last month invited Petrocaribe countries to Washington for a Caribbean Energy Security Summit, hosted by Vice President Joe Biden.
...
Over the weekend, Maduro claimed in a televised address that Biden had tried to foment the overthrow of his socialist government during the Caribbean energy summit. Maduro claimed that Biden told the Caribbean leaders that the Venezuelan government's days were numbered and it was time they abandon their support, a claim Biden's office dismissed.
Why would anyone think that the "future of Venezuelan oil sales" to the Caribbean countries is "in doubt"? It is not as long as the dully elected government of Venezuela is in its place.
But should the U.S. be successful with its current, renewed (pdf) "regime change" attempts in Venezuela the Petrocaribe scheme would likely be in jeopardy. As the leaders of the Caribbean countries are certainly smarter than the CNBC writers they will know that the Petrocaribe deal is incredibly good for them.
Why Biden believes that he can convince the Caribbean countries otherwise is beyond me.
Posted by b on February 4, 2015 at 17:02 UTC | Permalink
Yes indeed. The US wants any vestige of Chávez expunged from Venezuela. Anybody that is independent minded is target (Rousseff, Fernández, Ortega, Evo Morales, etc.). Heaven help us if we sign a treaty with China!
Posted by: Maracatu | Feb 4 2015 17:45 utc | 2
The caribbean countries are too weak to say no to Biden or anybody. The caribbean islands have been crushed under the neo-liberal imperial boot. The people are poor and extremely illiterate. The IMF, World Bank and other entities are very happy keeping them that way with constant austerity programs and a constant stream of unpayable loans.
USAID and UN charity help keep them alive but not thrive
The elites of the islands are bought and paid for whores.
The elites are US or UK educated, they are usually more pro-American than Yankees themselves.
Many of them are CIA assets.
The drug cartels have made crime and murder an exercise of insanity and fear for most in what used to be tranquil and quiet paradises.
The best and brightest leave in droves in a process that is viewed as "normal".
Just yesterday 2 Cuban players defected from a huge inter-american baseball game.
Most Latin-Americans just want to go to Miami and party at LIV or STORY on South Beach.
Most Caribbeans view their countries as JAILS many desperately want to simply LEAVE.
If you gave the whole island of Haiti a visa and a plane ticket to jump ship and live in Frankfurt Bernhard they would do so and the island would be empty in a month.
Hahahaha!
The islands do have groups here and there that believe in fighting the empire and it's cohorts.
However these forces don't have external support in the form of lets say Russia or China.
Without more external help from outside powers from even IRAN helping to patrol the waters of the caribbean would cut down on drug trafficing number one at halt or taper down the violence.
Then cutting off of the money would shake the CIA shadow funding and it would be less cost efective for the powers that be to maintain the HUGE embassies and shadow military personnel.
I hope, really do that the much trumped Nicaragua canal will bring in an outside player or players that will push away the USA ability to create so much mischief.
This is the USA's current power to mess up the fragile economies of the carribbean. The havok they wreak on these poor people is simply demonic. Sometimes I think they do things like what they do, just because they can.
Posted by: Fernando | Feb 4 2015 19:14 utc | 3
Petrocaribe is more than just a discount mechanism, it bypasses the middleman and is an alliance to unify these countries and that is what the US fears the most.
The US blocked Haiti from receiving oil through Petrocaribe until it was agreed that private shippers could profit from the aid.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 4 2015 19:55 utc | 5
@Maracatu@2
Heaven help us if we sign a treaty with China!
Remember Grenada, a tiny little island a bit bigger than Martha's Vineyard? Other than spices, it had no material resources that could be stolen by the US. It had no oil, no gas, no precious minerals, only an independent government unwilling to follow US orders. Under the pretext of "rescuing" US medical students, and the "clear and present danger" of the USSR building a submarine base (Grenada's shallow waters are unfit for such a thing), the butcher of East Timor/Nicaragua/Angola et al, circus clown RR invaded the island, thus killing all hopes for an independent destiny. Now there is Grenada tagging along the other little Caribbean paradises, going to cold and frigid DC for a meeting with that purveyor of malcontent, Ukraine butcher Joe Biden.
A lot less than an agreement with China will be needed to justify an intervention in Venezuela. Obama's Caribbean "pivot" opened up with the unfreezing of relations with Cuba, and will continue with eroding Venezuela's influence in the Caribbean. As of November, 2014, Venezuela guaranteed the supply of oil to Petrocaribe.
If anyone has information to the contrary, please provide it for everyone to see.
Posted by: Lone Wolf | Feb 4 2015 20:55 utc | 6
the US 'free press' yet again pursues a toxic agenda that could have been picked up from distriubuted memos from the US regime State dept
Posted by: brian | Feb 4 2015 21:15 utc | 7
Posted by: Lone Wolf | Feb 4, 2015 3:55:29 PM | 6
Thanks for the link, sounds about right to me.
Posted by: jo6pac | Feb 4 2015 22:04 utc | 8
The US must sense it all slipping away, because the propaganda really is in hyperdrive.
The thing about Kirchner and the "Chinese accented tweet" really had my eyes rolling. If the United States thinks it is going to nip the budding Chinese - Latin American relationship with juvenile stories more suited for TMZ and Gawker than the New York Times they're really in la la land.
As I stated recently - Venezuela has not survived 20 years in the cross hairs of the US through disastrous policies. This doesn't have anything to do with the "government" anyways - these changes are in the People's hearts, minds - and sometimes, even, their arms (both literally, their hands, and as in other meanings - armories full of AK-47s for local militias).
The US will no sooner get rid of what is happening in Latin America by a coup here or there than they can sop up the Amazon River with a washcloth.
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 4 2015 23:38 utc | 9
Right you are, Lone Wolf! I had to chuckle when I saw you mentioned Grenada. That was my baptism of fire, when I was hired way back in 1983 to cover news of the region. I co-authored a white-paper on the invasion and almost lost my job when the recalcitrant university chancellor chided me for titling the publication as an 'invasion'.
Posted by: Maracatu | Feb 4 2015 23:42 utc | 10
There's probably an element of blowback from the US-imposed 'sanctions' on Russia (from which USA appears to be selectively exempt) behind this half-baked story. The sanctions seem to be damaging the EU's economy more than Russia's, in the short term at least. And time is not on the EU's side. The predictable result of halving the price of oil was to compromise the financial viability of extraction from unconventional oil sources which require more infrastructure than oil pumped straight out of the ground.
The US will never admit that its sanctions are damaging not only the US itself, but friend and foe alike.
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Feb 5 2015 0:02 utc | 11
Imo, this story serves no purpose other than as an hasty attempt to reinforce the myths that the "take charge sorta guys" who run the USA are still in charge and are spectacularly more clever than everyone else...
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Feb 5 2015 0:44 utc | 12
Thanks for the link to the paper from Venezuela,b.
@10
I followed your link ... but no paper. Just advertisements :)
The US mainstream hypnotic media, along with everything else in the US, has been weaponized. Sometimes I think I really should return and try to join with others and organize to non-violently seize power ...
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
... but I haven't, have I. I think it's not only the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, but our Duty ... regardless the fact that I'm shirking it.
Posted by: jfl | Feb 5 2015 0:45 utc | 13
Speaking of Grenada, I was trying to fact check something. Has anyone ever heard of Black US troops organizing to refuse to fight there?
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 1:04 utc | 14
@13 The white paper is out of print and I don't think we've digitized its contents yet (I have only one remaining copy of my own). However, our Caribbean Monthly Bulletin IS online and that was the publication I was hired to edit commencing in 1983.
Posted by: Maracatu | Feb 5 2015 1:06 utc | 15
Worth remembering that in 2002 in Venezuela like in Ukraine's "Maidan" phony "revolution", there were also snipers organized by the coup plotters to kill innocent people and blame it on the government.
Like most criminal psychopaths, the CIA has an MO too.
Coup preparationsThe coup had been planned for at least six to nine months. On the evening of 11 April, with the coup in full swing, one coup plotter told television viewers that the coup had been long planned: "Nine months ago a movement started to organise itself more firmly, a serious movement, and fortunately it has come to fruition today."[42] Chávez ally Jorge García Carneiro, taken prisoner at Fuerte Tiuna, was told by a number of rebels – including General Enrique Medina Gómez, Venezuela's military attaché in Washington, D.C., who had flown to Caracas earlier in the day – that the plot had been planned for months. They also told him that the plan to kill a few people with snipers dated back years, as a way to ensure fewer deaths in the event of a coup. Lucas Rincón Romero, who came to Fuerte Tiuna around this time, later testified to the National Assembly that he had heard similar things, and that Vice Admiral Héctor Ramírez had told him he had been involved in the plot for six months.[43] CNN correspondent Otto Neustald has said that on the morning of 11 April he recorded a video message from a number of high-ranking military officers, led by Vice Admiral Héctor Ramírez, which was broadcast later in the day. The message, recorded at least two hours before the killings started, accused Chávez of massacring innocent people using snipers, referring to at least six dead and dozens wounded.
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 1:16 utc | 16
Steve Gowans' latest post, about Saudi oil price leverage is relevant to this thread. It has attracted a thought provoking comment.
https://gowans.wordpress.com/2015/02/04/saudis-use-leverage-over-oil-pricing-to-tempt-russia-to-withdraw-support-for-syria/#comments
The US mainstream hypnotic media...
Posted by: jfl | Feb 4, 2015 7:45:22 PM | 13
Domesticated Media tickles my funny bone.
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Feb 5 2015 1:20 utc | 17
Here's an excellent piece on Venezuelan coup in progress today, of which clearly this idiotic feces flinging by the US press which b has shared with us is a part of. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article40880.htm
Its so despicable to see every chintzy news outlet jump on this bandwagon just like they do all the time. No matter how wrong they are - that's all conveniently forgotten in time for the next spectacle. I don't know which they resemble more: cattle, vultures, or lemmings.
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 1:43 utc | 18
@14
I gave it a google but all I could find was wikipedia's Invasion of Grenada
The Congressional Black Caucus denounced the invasion and seven Democratic congressmen, led by Ted Weiss, introduced an unsuccessful resolution to impeach Ronald Reagan.
and as a bonus the CIA's 1984 Grenada Comic Book.
@15
Thanks! Im always happy to find new minor stream media sources. I'll have a look in the archives for your white paper.
@19 Oh, that comic book is great. So that's where CNN get's their ideas.
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 2:03 utc | 20
@19 @20
The cover says "Number 1 of a series", so true! Is there an Iran-Contra and a "Liberation of Panama" version of these out there too?
Posted by: W.H. Brewer | Feb 5 2015 4:27 utc | 21
@21 Haha. "Number 1 of a series"... of comic books or of pointless invasions of small countries?
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 4:32 utc | 22
OT but, who doesn't like cute YouTube girls who are into politics: http://youtu.be/MPGCwxNKsnE?t=38m49s
She's like a Greek version of Syrian Girl ;)
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 5 2015 4:40 utc | 23
@22 Oh but there's always a point, just ask Rummy and Uncle Dick aka The Penguin ;)
Freedom isn't free bro.
Posted by: W.H. Brewer | Feb 5 2015 4:43 utc | 24
@ b
I read yet again on Sic Semper Tyrannis that you have run afoul of Colonel Queeq's ban of any criticism of the Colonel's endorsement of Nato's murder of Qaddafi.
Imho, Lang is an out of work ex-spook who offers nothing to anyone and knows his limitations.
Posted by: sleepy | Feb 5 2015 5:11 utc | 25
If the caribbean countries recieved more support from external players, i.e. Russia or China even by way of funding groups that do not follow Washington's tune. They could and would find it extremely helpful to weaken the hold of the powers that be in this region. The lobby's of islanders in the USA could be appealed to support their home countries by swaying senators and congressmen in the states where they are huge minorities.
The caribbean cannot and must not allow the imperial regime to continue dictacting to them how to pursue their destinies. They are no longer colonies that in spite of their size should be respected.
The USA and Canada are plundering the Dominican Republics and Haiti's gold and other resources. The gold that is being taken out is being used for the future propping up of the dollar which as forecasted to be in major trouble and is as many of us have suspected is worth less than toilet paper.
The moneies being payed to both countries is garbage, in the mean time the rivers are going dry, the water poisoned and the forests being cut down.
Droughts are being forecasted for the place where the term "rainforest" was originally coined.
The QE subsidy is being eased out and trust me there ain't nothing easy about it.
The next target or victim is Cuba. The amount of gold available there is probably worth many, many plantains.
The Venezuelans should not allow themselves to lose this huge bargaining chip, it's a shame that now when he would have been more invaluable than ever that Chavez is gone and Fidel is due to age limited in his participation.
These two voices in the current world would have shined on the current world stage.
Pena Nieto is an imbecile.
Central America really doesn't carry much weight.
Maduro is tough but he is lacking in ability.
Correa's influence is potent but not enough.
Dilma seems to just react and doesn't set the tune or pace.
Kirchner is always either under attack or in the hospital.
Mujica is out of power.
Humala is a fraud.
Morales is very good but same as Correa.
There is currently no real true leader of Chavez stature, the only one who is close is Correa but Ecuador voice is not loud enough and it cannot project any influence beyond it's borders which is a shame.
The idea currently is to lobby as a group when dealing with the Washington regime, because each country individually is unable to make a dent against the USA.
Posted by: Fernando | Feb 5 2015 5:50 utc | 26
This speech by Freeman is worth reading in full for those interested in Peak Oil, and oil geopolitics.
http://chasfreeman.net/saudi-arabia-and-the-oil-price-collapse/
To traders the oversupply and growth in inventories signaled a clear trend toward lower future prices. Their apprehensions about an expanding oversupply of oil conspired to bring about a price collapse comparable to that in earlier speculative cycles.
Saudi Arabia is used to being blamed when prices seem too high. Now it’s being blamed for prices being too low. But the Kingdom had nothing to do with either the increase in supply or the recession-induced decrease in demand for oil. Nor did it bring about the collapse in prices. But its position as the world’s swing supplier gives it uncommon influence on expectations. And, as Riyadh saw it, the rapidly falling prices for oil confronted it with some stark choices.
The Kingdom could lead OPEC in trying to reverse some or all of the drop in prices by curbing production to reduce supply. But shoring up prices would enable other producers to continue investing profitably in expanded production from shale and oil sands, as well as deep-sea drilling. It would therefore allow higher-cost producers to continue to gain long-term market share at Saudi Arabia and other OPEC members’ expense. If OPEC members cut production, prices might rise somewhat but they would likely stabilize at levels that would still result in less revenue for the Kingdom and also slow, if not end, savings needed to fund the transition to an eventual post-petroleum Saudi economy. More damaging still, loss of future market share would cut the Kingdom’s future revenue from oil as well as its global clout. Adding insult to injury, the main beneficiaries of an OPEC production cut and consequent stabilization of oil prices would be the Iranian and Russian governments and American and Chinese consumers, not Saudi Arabia or other Arab oil producers.
Alternatively, Saudi Arabia could do nothing, accepting the loss of significant current revenue but allowing prices to fall to levels at which its competitors could no longer produce profitably or invest with confidence in new capacity to meet future oil demand.
For Riyadh, this is a “no brainer.” It is clearly smarter to eliminate current and future competition and assure future market share than to help competitors remain profitable at the expense of Saudi and other Arab oil producers’ patrimony and well-being in the decades to come. There are many reasons for this. I’ll give you seven.
First. Low prices don’t hurt the Saudi national oil company, Saudi Aramco, much. The world’s biggest oil company does not disclose its production costs, but estimates center around an average of $5 – 6 per barrel. In general, it appears to cost about $70 to produce a barrel of shale oil in the U..S.
Posted by: okie farmer | Feb 5 2015 5:50 utc | 27
@25 sleepy.. weird little thread going on over their.. i enjoyed b's link in his post though which others might also like to read. here
Posted by: james | Feb 5 2015 6:38 utc | 28
There is an article in circulation entitled "Guess What Happened The Last Time The Price Of Oil Crashed Like This?", and it seems to want to establish a causal link between the low price of oil and the global crash of 2008.
Yes, the last time oil was this cheap, there was a major recession, but the two are only indirectly linked.
I hope that Russia uses this opportunity to stop simply selling raw oil for consumer goods, but that would involve overcoming the inefficiency, cronyism and corruption of its current system.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Feb 5 2015 7:57 utc | 29
3
One word, Benhamin...
Sir?
One word, are you listening?
Yes, sir...
Operation Keystone.
That's two words, sir.
Once KXL goes into production, Venezuala will be overthrown by a coup.
Why else would Canada pump their sour tar sludge 1,000s of miles away?
Because Houston refineries are set up to process Venezualan sour tar sludge.
Houston NEEDS Venezualan sour tar sludge to run ... until KXL comes online.
Then it's over for the Bolivarians and their Last Confederation of the Free.
IPSO There is only enough 'Yellow Cake' for the Chosen of Mil.Gov.
FACTO You People must go eat dirt, figuratively and/or literally.
You can see this more clearly with mandatory jabs. The argument for mandatory
inoculations rests entirely on a mythic Aryan 'herd immunity'. Our xenophobic,
zionistic, racial separatism in a distilled pearlescent redux of Fed propaganda.
Like the mandatory neoliberal perpetual debt of the servant classes, 'cattle',
its 'extreme structural adjustments' are a necessary 'inoculation' against
chronic State debt, for their depredations in looting citizens they 'serve'.
This is your basic, you know, 'We Must Keep the Fatherland Pure.'
We have to eliminate all the Jews and Gypsys who bring 'disease' to the corpus.
We have to 'cleanse' the land of the unrepentant, the unbelievers, the apostates.
We have to 'inoculate' our children against the perversion of higher level thinking.
We have to maintain the 'herd immunity' against incurring private external debts,
which debit away from the Vampire Class' perpetual public debt obligation bleed.
See, it's really NOT about 'maintaining the herd immunity' at all. It can't be.
Anyway, so what does that have to do with Venezuala?
The transfer of wealth has always been called, at best, a zero sum game.
The Israeli Settler taunting the displaced and disenfrachised Palestinian:
"We won, you lost. It's just business, get over it. Now get off my land!"
Or as a USAID/CIA station chief once told me, "The People dont' decide
what gets built here (Afghanistan), ...the (foreign US) Government decides."
The Neo-Liberals will try to sell you on tax-and-spend to 'grow' your way
out of recession, except they can't point to any organic model on earth
where a 'tax' isn't bleeding the host, and a 'spend' engorging the parasite.
Mil.Gov is now on the threshold of bleeding $4 T a year out of the corpus,
and from there to over 100 (TAA) Designated Countries (siC) vendors, and
from there to countless offshore blind trust tax dodging accounts.
But it goes deeper than zero-sum. If my wealth is used for consumption,
but your wealth is used for investment, then when my wealth is lost to
your depredations, consumption will decrease, and cost-inflation from
your commodities speculation increase, further collapsing consumption
into a debt spiral, as we're seeing amply demonstrated in real time today.
Since tax revenues are directly related both to consumption and income
after investment losses, .: Mil.Gov necessarily destroys the Middle Class.
KXL will destroy Venezuala. It will give speculators a growth model as it
displaces redistributed VZ oil revenues that once went to consumers in
South America in the form of gas subsidies, even US communities under
Venezuala's program to provide the poor with subsidized winter fuel oil.
All those billions of consumer dollars freed up, that once cycled and then
recycled within their communities four, six, eight times before they were
caught in the Banksters nets, ...will be KXL'd away, $100Ms every day.
Venezuala is Every Man. Venezuala is the Factory Worker who brings
home the bacon, only to lose his/her job to some Chindian sweatshop
profit center. Once VZ oil income stops, then a junta coup is inevitable.
Then the Chosen will own the Bolivarian State, and the people of South
America will see only a jack boot stomping on their face ... forever.
As will we all, ...it's just a moment of sand through the hourglass away.
See how it works? Don't make me drop the US$ neutron bmob on your ass~!
Now go get your jab, before the SWAT team kicks down your door.
And that's why the Nicaraguan Canal will never happen.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 5 2015 11:14 utc | 30
@1 says " I'm shocked that little countries like this that won't tow the Amerikan line, are always made to look Bad
Consider the indispensable, if tedious, Chomsky who tells a possibly apocryphal anecdote about the Soviet commissars who came to the US back in the seventies, and left bewildered, saying "How do you do it? We have Siberia, Lubyanka, the thumbscrew, the rope and the knout - all you have is the NY Times, etc. - but your people follow the party line, far better than ours?'
Some cynic once said "money is the answer to 90% of the questions in life" - well, it is, just not in the way they meant it.
Posted by: gersen | Feb 5 2015 15:00 utc | 31
Don't know what you're unclear about b, a hit piece is a hit piece. They can't always be logical when spouting bullshit, so, the logic takes a hit. As you pointed out, not 5% of the people will read that, and not half of them will think about it. So, I wonder where your reasoning went. You prove bullshit day in and day out; here, you're suddenly thrown off by bullshit???
Thanks for your fine work
Posted by: scottindallas | Feb 5 2015 15:11 utc | 32
All tyrants are equal, but some are more equal than others.
Posted by: gersen | Feb 5 2015 15:24 utc | 33
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/05/nato-russia-vladimir-putin-confrontation-ukraine
Remember, always attribute to your enemy the crimes you commit yourselves:
"It is as if Putin has just conjured a slick new spin machine out of thin air .. there’s continuous lying, distorting the facts. It’s disgusting. Propaganda is morally reprehensible and rarely effective,” said a Latvian official involved in the media projects. But Putin television, like Fox TV, is highly effective. The west is at a loss as to how to counter what Nuland called “a new and vile foreign-financed propaganda campaign on our airwaves and in our public spaces”.
Stephen F. Cohen, how can we counter this "vile and foreign financed propaganda in our public spaces" when all we have is the truth, and our purity of heart?
Posted by: gersen | Feb 5 2015 15:51 utc | 34
gersen,
nuland can just hand out cookies.. that is the best way to counter russian propaganda, lolol..
stephen f. cohens comments are priceless!! he is as white as the driven snow!!!
Posted by: james | Feb 5 2015 19:55 utc | 35
forgot to mention how the guardian really went bad fast.. i think the last 2 years has seen the complete demise of the guardian which i used to have some respect for.. who bought it out?
Posted by: james | Feb 5 2015 19:56 utc | 36
The invasion of Grenada was the last war that the US won. Hahaha.
Posted by: Victor J. | Feb 5 2015 19:57 utc | 37
CNBC, a USA stock market TV channel that is mathematically impaired. Way too funny.
Posted by: Peter Pan | Feb 5 2015 22:09 utc | 38
So what's with the rush?
"Exclusive: U.S. pressing Cuba to restore diplomatic ties before April - officials" (Reuters)
Posted by: x | Feb 6 2015 15:05 utc | 40
The comments to this entry are closed.
The propaganda just keeps on coming and I'm shocked that little countries like this that won't tow the Amerikan line are always made to look Bad;) Yes the corp. owned free media just keeps on giving the Amerikan govt. talking points.
Posted by: jo6pac | Feb 4 2015 17:28 utc | 1