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February 13, 2015
Open Thread 2015-08
Comments
UN Finds Credible Ties Between ISIS And Israeli Defense Forces …
http://theinternetpost.net/2015/02/13/un-finds-credible-ties-between-isis-and-israeli-defense-forces/
Posted by: Alberto | Feb 13 2015 19:18 utc | 1
Beto@1
I know our language is degraded but calling this tripe “Credible” is ludicrous.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13 2015 19:29 utc | 2
#1
Here’s some more on that region and yesterday an Iran General said isis days were #
http://www.syrianperspective.com/2015/02/zionist-apartheid-state-cowering-with-jordan-as-syrian-army-and-allies-blast-their-terrorist-cannibals-in-south-the-take-from-syrper.html
Posted by: jo6pac | Feb 13 2015 19:56 utc | 3
Read the actual UNDOF reports. They details not only medical assistance but direct Israeli attacks against Hezbollah and Iranian anti-ISIS fighters, including the assassination of General Mohammad Ali Allahdadiand, and the subsequent death of a Spanish U.N. Observer on the Lebanese border during the Israeli counterattack to Hezbollah’s retaliatory strike on an IDF patrol in Sheba Farms.
http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/missions/undof/golan.shtml
They seem quite credible. Which doesn’t detract from the fact that the General was nasty fellow worthy of battlefield death.
Posted by: Charles I | Feb 13 2015 20:08 utc | 4
Leaked : TTIP negotiations to constrain regulations that protect public interest
Posted by: nmb | Feb 13 2015 20:37 utc | 5
C@4
I’m sure that the UN field reports are accurate but jumping from field reports to geopolitical alliances between Israel and the IS is pure speculation and nonsense. Did you notice that in Alberto’s report that the two “boxes’ have grown to “crates” and may soon be filled with Cruise Missiles.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13 2015 20:42 utc | 6
Then there is this: https://consortiumnews.com/2015/02/04/al-qaeda-saudi-arabia-and-israel/
Posted by: ben | Feb 13 2015 20:56 utc | 7
Also this:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=12278
Posted by: ben | Feb 13 2015 21:00 utc | 8
Of course, any such “proof” could be just contrived bs, we all know Governments NEVER lie to the people.
Posted by: ben | Feb 13 2015 21:04 utc | 9
Unprecedented 21st century drought risk in the American Southwest and Central Plains
In the Southwest and Central Plains of Western North America, climate change is expected to increase drought severity in the coming decades. These regions nevertheless experienced extended Medieval-era droughts that were more persistent than any historical event, providing crucial targets in the paleoclimate record for benchmarking the severity of future drought risks.
We use an empirical drought reconstruction and three soil moisture metrics from 17 state-of-the-art general circulation models to show that these models project significantly drier conditions in the later half of the 21st century compared to the 20th century and earlier paleoclimatic intervals.
This desiccation is consistent across most of the models and moisture balance variables, indicating a coherent and robust drying response to warming despite the diversity of models and metrics analyzed.
Notably, future drought risk will likely exceed even the driest centuries of the Medieval Climate Anomaly (1100–1300 CE) in both moderate (RCP 4.5) and high (RCP 8.5) future emissions scenarios, leading to drought conditions unprecedented during the last millennium.
The American response? World War for control of the fossil hydrocarbons that are creating “drought conditions unprecedented during the last millennium”, among other such terminal catastrophes.
Thank goodness we have a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate at the helm. Imagine what things would be like if we had one spreading death and devastation world wide while the continent burns?
Posted by: jfl | Feb 13 2015 21:04 utc | 10
You probably saw the report below at rt.com, but here’s the original. Published February 12, it’s amazing but predictable that it hasn’t been picked up by any US or European mainstream ‘news’ publications:
DOD Report Details Israel’s Quest for Hydrogen Bomb
By JANET MCMAHON
Thursday, February 12, 2015
In the midst of controversy over the Israeli prime minister’s plans to address Congress next month, a researcher has won the release of a decades-old Defense Department report detailing the U.S. government’s extensive help to Israel in that nation’s development of a nuclear bomb.
“I am struck by the degree of cooperation on specialized war making devices between Israel and the US,” said Roger Mattson, a former member of the Atomic Energy Commission technical staff. …
The tightly held report notes that the Israelis are “developing the kind of codes which will enable them to make hydrogen bombs. That is, codes which detail fission and fusion processes on a microscopic and macroscopic level.” …
During a hearing late last year, Smith told Judge Chutkan, “It’s our basic position that in 1987 the Department of Defense discovered that Israel had a nuclear weapons program, detailed it and then has covered it up for 25 years in violation of the Symington and Glenn amendments, costing taxpayers $86 billion.” …
Ben @ 7 …
“Although Moussaoui’s credibility came under immediate attack from the Saudi kingdom, his assertions mesh with accounts from members of the U.S. Congress who have seen a secret portion of the 9/11 report that addresses alleged Saudi support for al-Qaeda.”
“Today, Moore is backing former Florida governor and senator Bob Graham’s call for President Obama to reopen the investigation into 9/11 after new information emerged about the possible role of prominent Saudis.”
source – http://www.democracynow.org/2011/9/29/michael_moore_backs_call_to_re
“Fahrenheit 9/11” director Michael Moore plans to bring his superagents, Ari Emanuel and Mort Janklow, into a Michigan courtroom to help in his divorce.”
source – http://pagesix.com/2014/06/06/michael-moore-in-bitter-divorce-brings-in-ari-emanuel/
Ari Emanuel is Rahm Emanuel’s brother …
Apparently it’s time to throw the Saudi’s under the bus?
Ari Emanuel is the brother of Rahm Emanuel
Posted by: Alberto | Feb 13 2015 21:51 utc | 12
@6
With Jeffrey Feltman, as Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs and the REAL UN secretary ( think Cheney and Dubya), I won’t give that report credibility
Posted by: Yul | Feb 13 2015 21:51 utc | 13
This awesome map shows the complexity and massive ambition of the China-Russia-Europe ‘New Silk Road’. China also released a statement contrasting its economic development, ‘mutual prosperity’, ‘New Silk Road’ approach to international power relations with the US’s war-making capability and maintenance of regional military dominance approach. We US citizens won’t be given a choice at any foreseeable election, but if I could I’d vote for China:
China Voice: “Belt and Road” not reaction to U.S. Pivot to Asia
English.news.cn | 2015-02-13
BEIJING, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) — Rather than seeking regional dominance, China’s plans to build an East-West trade network across the Asian continent are pacifist in nature because of their inclusiveness and aim at mutual benefit.
Western media outlets have portrayed the proposals as a counterweight to the U.S. “Pivot to Asia” strategy of rebalancing its resources towards the Asia-Pacific. …
As an effort to revive … ancient routes of peace and exchange …, the “Silk Road Economic Belt” and the “21st Century Maritime Silk Road” initiatives — referred to collectively as the “Belt and Road” — do not challenge the fronts of Washington’s trademark policy, which is widely seen as an effort to ensure U.S. hegemony and security interests remain unchallenged in the region. …
Instead of seeking to establish an enlarged military presence that is likely to complicate the regional security situation, China’s proposals are purely about infrastructure, trade and economic cooperation …
Where’s the MSM reporting…?
Al-Sisi’s newest scandal
The leaked recordings of Al-Sisi and his cronies are emerging daily; they show that a gang of thieves is ruling Egypt. It isn’t enough for them to steal and loot Egypt’s countless wealth and bounties; they also resort to the extortion of money from countries that have already spent billions on them to stage a coup against the will of the people and allowed them to take charge. To make matters worse, they are begging in the name of a helpless nation, just like the street gang leaders who employ homeless children to beg and gain the sympathy of the people, but then take the money and fill their own pockets.
This is how the gang leader in Egypt treats the great Egyptian people. Along with his office manager, Abbas Kamel, and army Chief of Staff Major General Mahmoud Hegazy, Al-Sisi made very disparaging remarks about the Gulf States, which are “rolling in cash” while “our people are hungry and suffering”. Al-Sisi then instructed Kamel to get “$10 billion” each from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE, to be deposited in the army’s bank account, along with “a couple of pennies” for the state central bank to complete the 2014 budget. {…}
Posted by: CTuttle | Feb 13 2015 22:27 utc | 15
A Forbes ‘contributor’, Stephen Harner, excellent advocacy on the future of US-Japan-China relations by Seguchi Kiyoyuki, “research director specializing in the Chinese economy and Japan-U.S.-China relations at the Canon Institute for Global Studies (CIGS) in Tokyo.” Seguchi’s new essay is titled ‘Red Ships’–A China-Forced Second Opening of the Country–The Importance of Throwing Off Dependency on America and Reconstructing a National Goal. In essence, he says Japan needs to end its subordination to the US and strike out on its own, bridging the US and China. By the way, if you look at the map in @14, you’ll see that planned Japanese infrastructure links to the New Silk Road are minimal at best. There’s been talk of linking Japan’s Hokkaido (its big northern island) with Russia as a practical step to a closely economically linked Eurasian landmass, but obviously it’s not ‘serious’ at this point. Anyway, here’s Seguchi’s take …
Seguchi notes: During the first half of the 1990s, China’s economy was one-eighth of Japan’s. By 2000, it was about one-fourth. In 2009 China surpassed Japan; and in 2014 has become twice as large. By the year 2020 it will be three times Japan’s size.
The dramatic, world-altering rise of China should be greeted in Japan as a second “Black Ships” event, propounds Seguchi. Using the term “Red Ships,” he calls for a “Second Opening” of Japan, by which he means another complete re-evaluation of Japan’s place in the world, its international relations, governance and economic systems.
He is clear that continuing economic, political, and security dependency upon the United States is incompatible with (if not antithetical to) the new realities facing Japan and must be changed if Japan is to regain its vigor and self-confidence, and to find a proper place in the new world.
Unfortunately, it will be very difficult for Japanese politicians, for cultural reasons, to break free of their now ‘traditional’ US dependency, and also hard, for cultural reasons again, to move ‘toward’ China (though they’d really be moving toward ‘Eurasia’). They’ll probably end up being late for the party …
Tied into the Eurasian century and the New Silk Road is an essay by Seguchi Kiyoyuki, “Red Ships’–A China-Forced Second Opening of the Country–The Importance of Throwing Off Dependency on America and Reconstructing a National Goal.” You’ll note, if you look at the map @14, that planned Japanese infrastructure only minimally ties into Eurasia.
Seguchi notes: During the first half of the 1990s, China’s economy was one-eighth of Japan’s. By 2000, it was about one-fourth. In 2009 China surpassed Japan; and in 2014 has become twice as large. By the year 2020 it will be three times Japan’s size.
The dramatic, world-altering rise of China should be greeted in Japan as a second “Black Ships” event, propounds Seguchi. Using the term “Red Ships,” he calls for a “Second Opening” of Japan, by which he means another complete re-evaluation of Japan’s place in the world, its international relations, governance and economic systems.
He is clear that continuing economic, political, and security dependency upon the United States is incompatible with (if not antithetical to) the new realities facing Japan and must be changed if Japan is to regain its vigor and self-confidence, and to find a proper place in the new world.
What is imperative is forging viable, mutually beneficial, and dynamically productive relationship with China, a new China-influenced world and, especially, regional order.
F@14
Fair, did you see the story of the first trainload from the Chinese warehouse city to be shipped down the new Silk Rail Road? It was a Santa train full of cheap plastic toys straight from the sweatshops. I wonder if these trains will return mostly empty or filled with scrap and waste paper just as most of the Chinese containers do from the US
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13 2015 22:59 utc | 19
CT@15
Another huge story about Sisi was his attempt to influence the transition of power in the KSA which failed and may have even larger repercussions for his regime.
What happened to FDL? Is Jane back from rehab or is this The End.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13 2015 23:05 utc | 20
WoW @20 We’re still experiencing server probs and should be back up this weekend…!
New hashtag ridicules Sisi following audio leak
“Sisi loots Gulf”
Posted by: CTuttle | Feb 13 2015 23:23 utc | 21
19
There was a great article last week (and now it’s gone down the memory hole) about the impact on Germany’s economy after the Franco-Prussian War reparations paid (easily) by France had exactly the opposite effect the German’s hoped for, the influx of easy credit blew up the imperial economy and led to the deprivations of WW1, then German revolution.
Now the same deprivations of the global economy have made the USD the premiere currency in the world, there are massive inflows of foreign capital into US Treasuries and US Mil.Gov is raking in enormous tax revenues, while never seen before commodities and asset prices are blowing up a US economy, that in real terms is cratering.
At some point, the Fed International Banksters are going to ratchet up interest rates and start sucking $500B in interest-only debt repayment, FOREVER, out of US health and human services spending (the US Congress is passing 3 bills which together cut -8% across the board, with the exception of Defense and DHS, natch) preparing for that triple-witching hour, when America’s poor and elderly are liquidated in the New American Holocaust.
See, told ya’ we just had a Black Swastika Event, and it’s all playing out in real time.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 14 2015 0:10 utc | 22
In lemonde.com and cnn they show supposedly a Haitian who was lynched by a Dominican mob. However it turned out, he was killed by fellow countrymen after winning the lotto.
In Venezuela Maduro is once again undergoing a new conspiracy by “civil society” and NGO’s. It becomes more serious as maybe some military is involved.
In Brasil destabilization operations have begun with the blowing up of a refinery scores injured and deceased.
In Argentina the government of Cristina Fernandez is being assailed in the assumption of having murdered an oficial Alberto Nisman who was just about also allegedly to reveal the involvement of the government in a cover regarding Hizbollah and the blowing up of the Jewish cultural center in Buenos aires.
Posted by: Fernando | Feb 14 2015 1:10 utc | 23
14
P2Asia is a branding scheme for the NWO, it has nothing to do with imposing US will on China, but instead, on the American people! P2Asia has a specific goal of reversing the 40:60 Pacific:Atlantic basis of US Defense (sic) outlays, to 60:40, HOWEVER, the P2Asia marketing theme has a caveat: the ‘transition’, the ‘redeployment’ will be achieved WITHOUT CLOSING OR REDEPLOYING ANY ATLANTIC ASSETS. In other words, P2Asia is a massive covert new ‘Cold War’ buildup, and the metastasizing +13%/year Defense (sic) budget shows just that.
Read your daily Defense Contracts awards to see the STAGGERING level of fraud, waste and abuse, a $TRILLION a year American deathwatch, just like the $BILLION Boeing GBR ship-mounted radar to ‘monitor’ North Korea, went on its shakedown cruise (Boeing has ZERO ship experience), then returned to drydock and has been there since, being ‘overhauled’. Defense (sic) is just a blood and treasure Pipelinestan.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 14 2015 1:33 utc | 24
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13, 2015 5:59:41 PM | 19
Japan was shipping sweat shop sh!t to the US for 40 years which generated inward investment (strong controls on export of capital, which neoliberalism of course ‘doesn’t believe in’) for development of progressively higher value-added industries. As for the US, scrap metal and so on is very slightly better than nothing … very ecological, China re-using that stuff. ;.> As long as the US has no problem with scrap, war, Hollywood and loans being its main exports, you’ll know what its priorities and prospects are: scrap without the s.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 13, 2015 8:33:35 PM | 24
Pentagon: “Après moi, le déluge.”
Mitchell Prothero:
– The Kurds have received german weapons that allow the Kurds to destroy armored military vehicles from used by ISIS.
– The Kurds & the Shias are willing to defend their own territory, their own home turf but are unwilling to conquer the land that predominantly is populated by the Sunnis (e.g. Mosul) and is controled by ISIS.
– The shia government in Baghdad still has only very little control over the shia part of (former) Iraq, including Baghdad itself. Iran has send officers to lead the shia militias in those areas. And the shia militias are controlling that region, not the government.
– Muqtada Al Sadr didn’t & doesn’t like the fact that Iran has such a large influence in the regions that are populated by the shia. Al-Sadr is an Iraqi nationalist who wants to unite shias, sunnis & (perhaps) the Kurds back into a country called Iraq. Being a shia means that he would maintain friendly relations with Iran but Al Sadr doesn’t want to be Teheran’s sockpuppet.
In the current situation I consider it highly unlikely that Al-Sadr will return to Iraq anytime soon and become the leader of such an Iraq. Iraq, as we knew it, is gone.
Posted by: Willy2 | Feb 14 2015 2:57 utc | 26
some snippets from the rest of the world……
Get Lost shan • 6 days ago
* These fucking murcunts are a bunch of shameless assholes. They wanted to punish SL for being close to China but anytime their Treasury runs out of money and they want to borrow money they turn to China. *
Avatar
Jinadasa • 6 days ago
Why was it that the US embassy in Sri Lanka had a social media training program in Sri Lanka for all the NGOs last January? This was held only once. The American embassy in Ukraine had a similar program in 2013 before the elected government was replace by the current puppet government.
http://www.adaderana.lk/news.php?nid=29709
Ranil now says if Maithripala is elected he is going to roll back the 1.5 BILLION dollar Chinese funded Colombo Port City development, the largest development of its kind in the world. He is not interested in economic development of Sri Lanka or lifting people out of poverty with the thousands of jobs this project would create, he is ONLY interested in satisfying his US China Containment masters at the US Embassy in Colombo, which provides cover for US CIA personnel operating in Sri Lanka
http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2014/12/19/sirisena-seems-to-be-working-on-instructions-from-a-foreign-power/
*I take it for granted that any US diplomat in any foreign country is automatically a spy until proven otherwise, and so far, none has proven otherwise.
http://www.sabinabecker.com/2015/02/leamsy-salazar-the-deas-useful-spy.html
p.s.
thats my zwo watch rule 1.
my suggestion was to install mandatory electronic tagging device on all murcunt *diplomats*, better still pronounce them person non grata, but the best is to quarantine the fucking cuntry wholesale.
*What? The US is conspiring to keep South American countries poor and backward, the better to trick, blackmail and exploit them? I’m shocked. SHOCKED, I tell you!*
http://www.sabinabecker.com/2014/04/did-washington-try-to-prevent-bolivia-from-launching-a-satellite.html
Posted by: denk | Feb 14 2015 3:38 utc | 27
F@25
I don’t think you can make a valid comparison between these two very different countries and times. Japan rapidly moved to value added products such as electronics, autos and steel to feed the consumer growth in the US but even that hasn’t saved them from almost twenty years of economic stagnation.
China has made great improvements for many of their people but at what ecological costs. Their progress is unsustainable in my opinion especially with US decline and reduction in demand as austerity hits here and in Europe.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 14 2015 4:14 utc | 28
Aloha Tut – good luck with server issues!! We miss FDL even tho MoA is also informative. Mahalo for your work on it. Over & out.
Posted by: onitgoes | Feb 14 2015 4:31 utc | 29
Great read from Alastair Crooke: “”The coalition might well be encouraging Jordan down a path that may lead to the mobilization of an internal jihadist uprising against the monarchy, and to bringing ISIS closer to Israel.”
“Jordanians constitute the third biggest component within ISIS — estimated now at over 3,000. And the taproot to ISIS lies squarely in Amman’s distressed industrial suburbs, from which Abu-Musab al Zarqawi, whose very name derives from the misery belt of Amman (Zarqa, to which the dispossessed rural poor were drawn) well before the Iraq war. Notably, Jordanians also dominate the Nusra Front. In the first edition of Dabiq, ISIS’ magazine, the authors assert that it was al-Zarqawi who paved the way for the Islamic State. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (the present “Caliph”) derived his ideas for building the “Islamic State” from those of al-Zarqawi and Abu Omar al-Baghdadi (Abu Bakr’s predecessor).”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alastair-crooke/isis-jordan-strategy_b_6674252.html
Posted by: JohnH | Feb 14 2015 4:57 utc | 30
Lockdown – Cory Doctorow
I had a hard time choosing a quote from this article. Doctorow is like Heinlein…he takes you on a journey through lots of eminently relevant material, and no one paragraph is really representative of the whole.
…
It’s not that regulators don’t understand information technology, because it should be possible to be a non-expert and still make a good law. MPs and Congressmen and so on are elected to represent districts and people, not disciplines and issues. We don’t have a Member of Parliament for biochemistry, and we don’t have a Senator from the great state of urban planning. And yet those people who are experts in policy and politics, not technical disciplines, still manage to pass good rules that make sense. That’s because government relies on heuristics: rules of thumb about how to balance expert input from different sides of an issue.
Unfortunately, information technology confounds these heuristics—it kicks the crap out of them—in one important way.
The important tests of whether or not a regulation is fit for a purpose are first whether it will work, and second whether or not it will, in the course of doing its work, have effects on everything else. If I wanted Congress, Parliament, or the E.U. to regulate a wheel, it’s unlikely I’d succeed. If I turned up, pointed out that bank robbers always make their escape on wheeled vehicles, and asked, “Can’t we do something about this?”, the answer would be “No”. This is because we don’t know how to make a wheel that is still generally useful for legitimate wheel applications, but useless to bad guys. We can all see that the general benefits of wheels are so profound that we’d be foolish to risk changing them in a foolish errand to stop bank robberies. Even if there were an epidemic of bank robberies—even if society were on the verge of collapse thanks to bank robberies—no-one would think that wheels were the right place to start solving our problems.
However, if I were to show up in that same body to say that I had absolute proof that hands-free phones were making cars dangerous, and I requested a law prohibiting hands-free phones in cars, the regulator might say “Yeah, I’d take your point, we’d do that.”
We might disagree about whether or not this is a good idea, or whether or not my evidence made sense, but very few of us would say that once you take the hands-free phones out of the car, they stop being cars.
We understand that cars remain cars even if we remove features from them. Cars are special-purpose, at least in comparison to wheels, and all that the addition of a hands-free phone does is add one more feature to an already-specialized technology. There’s a heuristic for this: special-purpose technologies are complex, and you can remove features from them without doing fundamental, disfiguring violence to their underlying utility.
…
Posted by: Dr. Wellington Yueh | Feb 14 2015 5:35 utc | 31
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 13, 2015 11:14:44 PM | 28
The twenty years of stagnation in Japan was and still is, relative to the rest of the world, at a very good economic level for most people, with good equality (but getting worse recently) and still relatively low unemployment. Things could be a lot worse. Growth isn’t the point, and I don’t think low economic growth like 1% is a problem, unless I’m just thinking like an investor.
I think China is more or less on the Japanese schedule now but will veer off soon enough; it’s unlikely to create Japanese levels of equality, unless something unrealistic happens like the the working class waking up and organizing. You’re also right that US, Western European, and Japanese consumption that feeds Chinese inward investment is leveling off. So much more consumption starts needing to be internal. To deal with that, China should try to create a giant prosperous working class and a much larger middle class, but my guess is that the powerful elite in China are split on whether to go that direction (the nationalists like this because it creates a larger economy and a politically/militarily stronger nation) or to keep on the “10% rich 80-90% poor” kind of society (which the elite probably thinks is best for their personal interests) track they’re on now. Probably things will come down somewhere in the middle. But the technically advanced infrastructure projects are all good: they reduce costs for industry and should create fairly well-paid members of the working class. The more of that the better, and there will be a lot of it. Anyway, no one is predicting economic stagnation in China over the next 20 years, more like gradually lower rates of growth that are still triple or quadruple whatever Europe is managing. Which will be enough of a magnet to draw Europe into the Eurasian century. Europe’s capitalists must have some of those profits.
interesting
but lets look at it from another angle …lets take market forces…CFD,s for instance.it is a trillion dollar market…smoke playing with mirrors to steal pieces of the mirror through leverage.amazing weapon in the hands of level 42 players.what if the underlying asset becomes,not cars or not phones or not oil but human beings…human lives
“once you take the hands-free phones out of the car, they stop being cars.”
how about once you take the humans out of cars,they stop destroying the planet
see thats the problem human beings should be the underlying asset and not cars
but because it is the other way round human beings are headed for extinction….cars of course will survive along with all that garbage floating off the coast of america…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch
if the trillion dollar CFD,s market used leverage to pay for the cleanup of this “patch” then this planet might survive
believe me when i say garbage removal is an asset to be traded…because it will eventually consume other assets…like fish stocks..destruction of enviroment as moisture from a poisonous ocean is deposited on land,and ……..
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 14 2015 6:44 utc | 33
Escalation: US Sending Over 4,000 Ground Troops to Kuwait
Over 4,000 ground combat troops from Fort Carson’s 3rd Brigade are being sent to Kuwait under this new deployment, where they will make up the region’s largest collection of US ground troops, which will include heavy armored vehicles.
There’s not even the pretense that these guys aren’t being sent for a very heavy ground war.
The White House has admitted as much this week as well, following up President Obama’s Tuesday pledge not to get involved in a ground war with talk of “flexibility,” and dismissing the AUMF pledge to avoid “enduring offensive ground combat operations” as literally meaningless, saying they had no definition at all of “enduring.”
With a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate in charge The War is never ending.
Posted by: jfl | Feb 14 2015 9:37 utc | 34
Notes on police violence in America
“Indian grandfather partially paralyzed by Alabama police beating”
“Washington police fatally shoot immigrant worker for allegedly throwing rocks”
“Philadelphia police officers charged after footage of beating surfaces”
“Lawsuit filed after San Diego police beat two brothers for entering their own home”
“Police in North Carolina shoot 74 year-old in his own home during welfare check”
None of this is unusual, it’s just that (for the following 15 minutes?) these stories are being reported.
Posted by: jfl | Feb 14 2015 9:52 utc | 35
US media and Juan Cole abuzz about ISIS attack 5 or 9 miles, depending on the source, from base housing US soldiers. But try to find the base, “al-Ain” or “al-Ain Sharjah” on google maps, and it isn’t there.
Juan Cole’s page suggests that the town is northwest of Baghdad. What are US troops doing there?
Is this story real, or are the usual suspects doing their usual fearmongering again? And why isn’t the headline that “US troops near fight in Iraq?”
Posted by: JohnH | Feb 14 2015 15:46 utc | 36
Another ‘cartoonist’ shooting. This time Denmark, again.
Posted by: L Bean | Feb 14 2015 16:31 utc | 37
JH@36
The battle is taking place north of Ramadi, not Baghdad, in Anbar Province and the conflict for the town al Baghdadi has been ongoing for months, this may explain your confusion.
The attacks on the base where US trainers are located is new and seems to be escalating.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 14 2015 16:39 utc | 38
Posted by: CTuttle | Feb 13, 2015 6:23:52 PM | 21
Thanks for the update I was wondering what was up.
Posted by: jo6pac | Feb 14 2015 17:50 utc | 39
Der Spiegel’s canons of journalistic integrity:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/greece-struggles-to-get-europe-to-change-course-on-austerity-a-1017533.html:
Paragraph 1 states it is a “myth” that the IMF style Greek bailout was “only” for the foreign banks:
“One of the myths of Greek aid is that the billions of euros made available by Europe only helped the banks rather than the country and its people. In other words, that it wasn’t Greece that was bailed out, but German financial institutions and insurance companies, for example.”
Paragraph 2 admits what it just denied:
“That isn’t wrong. But .. It is true that only the smallest portion of the aid package flowed into the Greek budget to help Athens meet its spending obligations. The largest portion went toward paying back debts.”
Posted by: gersen | Feb 14 2015 18:07 utc | 40
it has been speculated by nato war planners if turkey were to be attacked from the rear by isis whether greece would help….i guess the bailout would suggesr otherwise
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 14 2015 21:43 utc | 41
VineyardSaker: 70th commemoration of the Dresden Holocaust
My paternal grandparents were in Dresden when it got bombed. My (Estonian) godmother and her husband adopted a son of their friends, because their friends got killed by the Allied bombardment.
The firebombing of Dresden was militarily pointless. My 8th grade social studies teacher said that the Russians fed the Anglos false information about Dresden, because the Russians were curious about what the bombing would be like. Now I think that the Anglos made that story up to shift he blame for the holocaust unto the Russians as usual.
An article on Voltairenet worth reading:
Seeking a Multipolar World Inside the Quite Unipolar Informational Medium
It’s exactly this close to total monopoly over information which makes the real difference. So even though US economic relevance has been sharply declining in the past decades, its informational relevance has paradoxically been growing. Therefore, countries today aiming to a true multipolar world should revise their priorities and start to seriously compete on the informational field, rather than focus just on economic issues. Power today is all a matter of perception and the US is still the unmatched master of this game. We won’t have any truly multipolar world until other players with comparable skills enter the game.
I am really amazed at how in lockstep all the European corporate media I follow – British and German, not French so much – with US propaganda since about 2000. The European corporate media following USG on everything alone makes Europe a colony of the US.
Posted by: gersen | Feb 14, 2015 1:07:52 PM | 40
LOL comment of the day! Unless it’s this one from the Guardian, under some media promotion/review of the Shades of Gray/Grey movie:
The lead character is named “Christian,” even though this can be seen as an affront to Christians all over the world. This shows a cultural insensitivty to that religion from the book publishers and producers. One can see that the attacks on Christianity by media are most definately not in the realm of conspiracy theory, they are real.
Unfortunate headline. I know I wouldn’t attend one if I had a choice:
“Shooting at Copenhagen event attended by controversial Swedish artist Lars Vilks”
Posted by: Demian | Feb 14, 2015 8:00:32 PM | 44
Demian, excellent Roberto Quaglia piece, but your link doesn’t work. It’s here: http://www.voltairenet.org/article186722.html
It was amazing how the US-controlled European media could twist facts during the recent crises in Ukraine. The Nazi-infected junta of Kiev which came to power with a coup was able to bomb and kill their own citizens for months while the western media would always depict them as the good side – while at the same time Putin would be portrayed as the new Hitler for no reality-based reason.
Unexceptionally, I experienced this on Facebook in my non-fairleft persona, where I _thought_ it was okay to point out what the ‘caught red-handed’ Nuland-Pyatt phone call obviously meant, but even that is outside the bounds of civilized, ‘nice’ discussion. If you post anything political, you can retain ‘nice’ person status only with ‘support the troops’ posts or ‘apolitical’ stuff that ridicules or demonizes whoever the Pentagon wants to demonize/ridicule this week.
@47 Good point fairleft. I made a mildly critical remark about Pussy Riot/Madonna on FB and was berated for misogyny.
Posted by: dh | Feb 15 2015 2:05 utc | 48
@fairleft #47:
Thanks for posting the correct link. I never signed up with Facebook and don’t intend to. But as I mentioned, I recently set up a Twitter account using an “alias” and have been tweeting.
I recall your saying that you edit Wikipedia. So do I. But I have stopped editing the Ukraine related articles, and don’t know if I’ll start again. It’s an uphill struggle, because what are considered to be “reliable sources” consistently lie. The Novorossiyans will win the war on the ground; waging the war in English Wikipedia is largely futile.
11
Hope yet for US all!
CIA (and Mossad) have invested in a new PPP technology they say can bring
$Billions more in funding to the National Security State, thereby easing
the ‘egregious’ tax burden on wealthy investors and money launderers, by
cutting off at the kneecaps any attempt to increase capital gains taxes.
Here’s how it works:
PPP LLC has patented a way to turn peoples’ hopes and dreams into nut butter.
Since pigs will eat anything, it’s the Perfect Profit Path to ‘clean up’ the
environment, since Congress’ Wacka-Wacks will fund anything remotely ‘green’.
Dreams -> nut butter -> Pigs – > Pig Poop Power -> Fed Green Funds -> ++ DoD
We’re saved!!
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 15 2015 2:45 utc | 50
33
If American ingenuity can mount IED cell-detonator scrambling devices on MRAPs, which they successfully did, reducing IEDs back to fire-by-wire again, then there is absolutely no reason every US vehicle can’t have onboard moving vehicle cell scramblers mandatory.
8,000 American cyclers and pedestrians are mowed down every year by SUV driving DUI-texters.
That’s a 9/11 every six months. That’s a OIF-OEF war kill every six months. Of every year.
That’s an American Holocaust.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Feb 15 2015 2:55 utc | 51
@51 The answer is obvious. Cyclists and pedestrians should all have their own drones to warn of oncoming SUVs.
Posted by: dh | Feb 15 2015 3:15 utc | 52
@51/52 here in b.c. they have a law that bans the use of cell phones while driving.. that seems fairly self explanatory.. if it isn’t cars accidents, it is cyclists, or pedestrians being moved down. i guess a lot of places like carnage..
Posted by: james | Feb 15 2015 8:18 utc | 53
Q: You were born in Israel but you are against Israeli occupation and its politics. You are living in the West, how do you cope?
A: Let me tell you something and it is crucial. In my entire career, I have never been subject to abuse by the British government, never been subject to abuse by the American government. Although the infamous Alan Dershowitz, who is now implicated in a huge sex scandal with minors, labelled me ‘as the number one enemy of the Jewish people,’ I’ve never been subject to direct abuse by the Israeli government. Even the NSA doesn’t harass me. The only people who stalk me continuously are the Jewish left and the Guardian newspaper. I can say that it’s not a problem but I came to the realization that the biggest enemy of our elementary freedoms are the progressives and I’ll explain why.
In the West and maybe in Turkey as well, we have issues with political correctness. What is political correctness? Political correctness is politics that doesn’t allow political opposition. But this is clearly the definition we associate with dictatorship. But political correctness is far worse than dictatorship. Why? Because in the case of dictatorship you experience an opposition to a regime that is distinct from you, but in the case of political correctness it is you who silence yourself. Political Correctness is a form of self-censorship. The Jewish left and the progressives made us into a collective of impotents. Our task is to move on and to erect our resistance against this cancerous ideology.
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 13:35 utc | 55
the evidences are overwhelming, im compelled to pronounce
navi pillay,
head honcho of unhrc, the highest office dealing with human rights in the world,
GUILTY AS CHARGED.
*Navi Pillay’s call for an ‘international investigation into war crimes in Sri Lanka’ are to satisfy the 3 prime movers (US,UK and India)
*Why does Navi Pillay
Not investigate the military interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Yugoslavia and the suffering of these people as a result of US/NATO bombing?
JUST TO NAME A FEW…..
*Navi Pillay needs to be investigated. Her credibility is wearing thin. She has shown that she is nothing but an imperial tool, a modern version of the Indian sepoy ever ready to use the international position given to her to serve the white masters.
http://www.defence.lk/new.asp?fname=Navi_Pillay_is_disqualified_to_be_Head_of_UNHRC_20140306_01
Posted by: denk | Feb 15 2015 14:08 utc | 56
Q: What do you think about what Ahmadinejad said about the Holocaust?
A: I agree 100 percent with everything Ahmadinejad said about the Holocaust. Ahmadinejad basically said that Holocaust must be treated as a historical chapter. At the moment it is treated as a religion. And if it is a religion I want to maintain my right to be an atheist. In contemporary Judified reality it is OK not to believe in God but if you don’t believe in Auschwitz you will be penalised and severely. I don’t accept it.
This is not only “Judified reality”, it is Judeo-Christian reality, since the official Russia subscribe with this it is European world reality – a control of thought tool of totalitarian regimes!
Q: Do you agree that a Holocaust is happening in Gaza?
A: I don’t know what the Holocaust is anymore. I’m like Ahmadinejad in that regard. When I was a kid they taught me that the Nazis made soap out of Jews. And then I grew up and realized it was all a fantasy. They taught me that the Arabs were going to throw us into the sea. And when I was mature enough to learn the history on my own I realized that it was actually the Jews who threw Palestinians into the sea. Then I realized that Jews (like everyone else) tend to project their cultural symptoms on others. The Jews are fearful of the Palestinians because the Jews witness their army engaged in murderous activity. They must believe the Palestinians are as murderous as the IDF happens to be.
I don’t want to talk in terms of the Holocaust because it is too Jewish. I don’t want to compare Israel with Nazism because Israel is bad enough. From some perspectives Israel is worse than Nazism (Israel is a Jewish democracy it implies a collective responsibility). When I compare Israel with Nazism I reaffirm the Holocaust religion and sustain the primacy of Jewish suffering. We have to establish a new discourse where Israelis are the worst enemy of humanity and the Palestinians are the ultimate sufferers. Auschwitz was indeed bad, but not as bad as Gaza.
Pretty much everything what we know about Holocaust is a lie. A lies produced by the White Man in order to get rid of the Jews at expense of the other. A lies include even The Diary of Anne Frank story to Hollywood nowadays.
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 14:10 utc | 57
http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/2015/2/14/i-was-born-in-israel-many-years-before-i-realized-israel-was-palestine
forgot to put link.
it is not that I am fun of him just stumble upon this. He has some very good point.
@ L Bean | Feb 14, 2015 11:31:55 AM | 37
You seem enjoying PsyOps very much! Do you?
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 14:17 utc | 58
“Not investigate the military interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Yugoslavia and the suffering of these people as a result of US/NATO bombing?”
I always laughing over idiocy when I see name of Yugoslavia mentioned in this context. I guess you have an “education” but you do not have knowledge. It is not surprising give state of mind of “civilized” world.
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 14:23 utc | 59
neretva’43 | Feb 15, 2015 9:23:26 AM | 59
so *wise guy*, why dont u enlighten me, i dont pretend to
be a know it all !
Posted by: denk | Feb 15 2015 15:08 utc | 60
it is very simple, Yugoslavia had ceased to exist 1992, or when Slovenia first and than Croatia declared independence.
Milosevic wanted to keep that name from the legacy reasons, when if fact his ultra-natioanlistic (fascist) project became what it is today – Serbia. New reality was Kosovo, instead of enlargement Serbia become even smaller.
Enlargement/Imperialism of Serbia, at expense of neighboring states, was prevented paradoxically by NATO. Who would say that can happen, but there is a price to pay for newly created “independent” states. Economically and socially every one of them is in catastrophic situation. New reality was Kosovo, instead of enlargement Serbia become even smaller. Bosnia (Dayton accord) is dysfunctional bu all accounts.
Very much the same situation is today in Ukraine, but Serbia don’t have the might of Russia. All this shit: negotiation, propaganda war, battles, civilian victims I’ve seen there. In conclusion, the US by itself is fascist, thus employing the most extreme element of the political spectrum, yet they had had crucial role, in every aspect. In ex Yugoslavia, in Ukraine, in Iraq everywhere, no negotiation will help. Will there be dysfunctional Ukraine, I do not know, better be for everybody, NO.
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 16:36 utc | 61
dude
the question is..
*Why does Navi Pillay
Not investigate the military interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Yugoslavia and the suffering of these people as a result of US/NATO bombing?
why is that an *idiocy* ?
Posted by: denk | Feb 15 2015 17:26 utc | 62
It appears that Iran and their Foreign Fighters are taking over for Assad’s side in the offensive in southern Syria with one of the goals to open a second front against Israel. It will be interesting to see how the IDF responds to this agenda, so far they are observing the situation but not acting.
Another strange rumor is that al Nusra is splitting from al Qaeda and joining the Islamic Front in the conflict in Syria.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Feb 15 2015 17:59 utc | 64
Details Of Assassination Plot On Occupy Movement Leaders Withheld From Public At FBI’s Behest
A heavily-redacted FBI document first revealed a Houston plot “to gather intelligence against the leaders of the protest groups and obtain photographs, then kill the leadership via suppressed sniper rifles.”
By Courthouse News | February 11, 2015
Occupy Houston assassination plot records won’t be released
Dylan Baddour, Houston Chronicle | February 9, 2015
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Feb 15 2015 18:39 utc | 65
There are a number of Pink Floyd admirers here. So I have a question for you: which is the quintessential Pink Floyd song? I would say that there is no question that Dark Side of the Moon is the Floyd’s most perfect album, and I would say that “Breathe (in the Air)”, not “Time” is the quintessential Pink Floyd song. Breathe is so easy, whereas Time is over the top.
I don’t think that there is any question that the Floyd are to rock and to pop music as J.S. Bach is to classical music. One thing that has always struck me about the Floyd is how well their vocals match the rhythm of the song. I don’t think that any other band has ever reached their level of perfection in that respect.
Finally, I love the English language, and I like texts which restrict themselves to monosyllabic words.
And all you touch and all you see
Is all your life will ever be.
I don’t think that there is any question that Pink Floyd were the greatest band, until punk rock emerged. The Sex Pistols understood this.
#65
pink floyd in retrospect is crap..never listen to it anymore…still have time for santana though…caravanserai
bob dylan wrote this
Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues”
When you’re lost in the rain in Juarez
And it’s Eastertime too
And your gravity fails
And negativity don’t pull you through
Don’t put on any airs
When you’re down on Rue Morgue Avenue
They got some hungry women there
And they really make a mess outa you.
Now if you see Saint Annie
Please tell her thanks a lot
I cannot move
My fingers are all in a knot
I don’t have the strength
To get up and take another shot
And my best friend, my doctor
Won’t even say what it is I’ve got.
Sweet Melinda
The peasants call her the goddess of gloom
She speaks good English
And she invites you up into her room
And you’re so kind
And careful not to go to her too soon
And she takes your voice
And leaves you howling at the moon.
Up on Housing Project Hill
It’s either fortune or fame
You must pick up one or the other
Though neither of them are to be what they claim
If you’re lookin’ to get silly
You better go back to from where you came
Because the cops don’t need you
And man they expect the same.
Now all the authorities
They just stand around and boast
How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms
Into leaving his post
And picking up Angel who
Just arrived here from the coast
Who looked so fine at first
But left looking just like a ghost.
I started out on burgundy
But soon hit the harder stuff
Everybody said they’d stand behind me
When the game got rough
But the joke was on me
There was nobody even there to bluff
I’m going back to New York City
I do believe I’ve had enough.
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 15 2015 20:11 utc | 68
Nerevta you seem to enjoy psychic readings. Well, do you?
Posted by: L Bean | Feb 15 2015 20:19 utc | 69
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 15, 2015 2:43:29 PM | 66
link, post #58
Posted by: neretva’43 | Feb 15 2015 20:30 utc | 70
mcohen at 67 —
I share your high opinion of Santana’s “Caravanserai,” some fine old vinyl, maybe his best. Like lots of folks, I grooved to his collaborations on “Supernatural” esp. “Put your Lights On” with Everlast. And down with Dylan; the 50th. anniv. concert has got some great performances of his songs, including Neil Young doing “Tom Thumb” as well as “All Along the Watchtower.”
So it troubles me to see you so down on a great band. Maybe not quite as up there as Demian at 65 might think (no one tops the Beatles, in cultural or artistic impact; more like Beethoven than the Baroque formalism of Bach, btw).
But I’m hoping my candidate for best Floyd song might get you to concede that maybe once they had it going.
It’s hard to argue against “Dark Side” as Pink Floyd’s best album, . But as to best song, I’d go a back to some of the earliest work that defined their signature style with Gilmour — From “Meddle,” “One of these Days”, excellent live version from the 1990’s.
Posted by: rufus magister | Feb 15 2015 22:34 utc | 72
Interesting online resource: http://www.unz.org/Pub/Ramparts
This site seems to have an amazing assortment of PDFs of old periodicals. I chose Ramparts (complete run 1962-1975) because that’s how I found it, but it seems that they have tons of interesting stuff. 119 years of The Nation, 35 years of In These Times, all the I. F. Stone’s Weekly. Pretty amazing.
I still can’t seem to find anyplace that has copies of Covert Action Information Bulletin though. Anyone got any leads?
Posted by: guest77 | Feb 16 2015 3:18 utc | 73
How many of the bullying countries accusing Sri Lanka of crimes
against humanity and war crimes have clean hands or a flawless
record?” asks Senaka Weeraratne, a Sri Lankan lawyer and
international affairs analyst. [+]
tsk tsk tsk,
unhrc wants to investigate the BS *tam massacre of unarmed
protestors*, 1989. [0]
while fukus have been committing a fullujah every other day since
Time immemorial !
then again, how come the world’s *highest office on human rights* ,
the nobel peace prize committee etc have never heard of the world
record holder of hunger strike, the iron lady of manipur ? [1]
*Human rights activist Irom Sharmila, on hunger strike for the last 14 years in protest against alleged army atrocities, has been re-arrested a day after being released from detention in India’s northeastern Manipur state.
*alleged* my ass.
army/police atrocities in india is practically a daily routine, just that u never hear about it in the western msm, which dutifully remind u about the *tam massacre* every 4/6 without fail.
this was what trigger the *iron lady of manipur* to launch her hunger
strike 15 yrs ago.
INDIAN ARMY RAPE US ! [2]
hmm…
myanmar, sri lanka , china, zim etc all in the cross hair of the unhrc, aka UnHumanRightsCommision, can we say…the murcunts *official enemy list* ?
hehehehe
everthing touched by the *shit stirrer* turn into shit,
HUMAN RIGHTS MUST BE THE MOST ABUSED PHRASE OF THE CENTURY.
[+]
http://www.eurasiareview.com/04032014-sri-lanka-unhrcs-navi-pillay-faulted-abuse-power-analysis/
[0]
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-06-04/news/50329833_1_tiananmen-anniversary-hong-kong-internal-affairs
[1]
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/southasia/2015/01/lady-manipur-rearrested-indian-police-150124045215179.html
[2]
http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2118/stories/20040910007400400.htm
Posted by: denk | Feb 16 2015 3:46 utc | 74
Someone has dreamt up an alternative euphemism for Mr Hopey Changey.
In a CounterPunch article called Playing with Fire in an Age of Absurdity, polemicist Andrew Levine, borrowing from the Governator meme, says of Obama…
“Obama will be remembered not so much as an innovator but as the Continuator of Bush-Cheney era policies.”
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Feb 16 2015 4:49 utc | 75
@neretva’43 #57:
it is Judeo-Christian reality, since the official Russia subscribe with this it is European world reality
There is no such thing as Judeo-Christianity. That concept is a Zionist ploy to delink Western civilization from its Christian foundations. Fortunately, unlike the West, Russia has not succumbed to that ploy, and its religion is still Orthodoxy, not the Holocaust Religion.
@mcohen #67
bob dylan wrote this
Who the hell is Bob Dylan???
@rufus magister #71:
It’s hard to argue against “Dark Side” as Pink Floyd’s best album, . But as to best song, I’d go a back to some of the earliest work that defined their signature style with Gilmour — From “Meddle,” “One of these Days”, excellent live version from the 1990’s.
I didn’t know about that track; I will listen to it. “One of these Days” is one of the Pink Floyd songs I first became aware of, because a BBC documentary about physics used it.
As for Gilmour, my favorite track of his is Fat Old Sun. The guitar solo that it finishes with is the most ecstatic guitar solo I know. And this is primal Floyd, with the guitars and bass talking to each other in a jam. Vladimir Putin said that the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was the Soviet Union breaking up. I think the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was Roger Waters leaving Pink Floyd. I can also not think of anything more delightfully English than this song. It begins and ends with change ringing, which is probably England’s greatest contribution to music before pop. i think this song also contradicts the claim you made that the Floyd were always dark.
It’s hard to argue against “Dark Side” as Pink Floyd’s best album, . But as to best song, I’d go a back to some of the earliest work that defined their signature style with Gilmour
I didn’t mean to suggest that it’s their best song. I think it’s their most representative song, even though it doesn’t have keyboards. You agree with me that Dark Side of the Moon is their best album, and “Breathe” is what the album really begins with. It has the mellow syncopated drums, the harmonizing vocals of Gilmour and Wright, and Gilmour’s slide guitar.
another deadly wmd in the fukus arsenal,
a *hr* missile with iff [1] capability, homing in on
fukus’s OFFICIAL ENEMY LIST.
http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-news-is-twisted.html
Posted by: denk | Feb 16 2015 5:33 utc | 77
@mcohen #67:
pink floyd in retrospect is crap..never listen to it anymore…still have time for santana
That is without any doubt the most repulsively ignorant comment I have ever seen at MoA, and possibly on the Internet in general. You make Cold and Ulster sound like paragons of reason, virtue, and good taste.
I can understand Anglos and East Europeans hating Russia and Russians. But hating Pink Floyd? That is beyond the pale. Even my mother liked Dark Side of the Moon! Even though she was totally retro and never learned to speak English properly.
For your information, this is what haters of the Floyd look like. (h/t to The Outer Limits) Hatred of the Floyd can only be interpreted as absolute evil.
@rufus magister #71:
as to best song, I’d go a back to some of the earliest work that defined their signature style with Gilmour — From “Meddle,” “One of these Days”, excellent live version from the 1990’s.
Your link doesn’t work. I take it that you wanted to link to this. But I don’t find that to be superior to the album version, although it is excellent.
#77 demain
these lyrics from “money”
“money its a hit,don,t give me that do goody good bullshit”
goody good ????
demain old chap ….thats what i call crap,of the pompous variety,upper crust but smelly in the middle
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 16 2015 9:41 utc | 81
#71 rufus
when dark side came out i bought it…thought it was good,those were the days,probably have moved on.caravanserai has a timeless quality to it that dark side lacks……have you read “savage detectives” by roberto bolano,check it out
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 16 2015 10:09 utc | 82
@mcohen #79:
Your post demonstrates that you are semilitarate. Thus, it should come as no surprise that you don’t understand Pink Floyd, since understanding Pink Floyd requires having a minimal command of the English language and a non-trivial familiarity with Western music.
@rufus magister #71:
It’s hard to argue against “Dark Side” as Pink Floyd’s best album
I think the quintessential Pink Floyd moment comes in Time at 2:16 when the keyboards and kettle drums switch to hard rock. And there are these lyrics:
And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it’s sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death
Those lyrics match the music perfectly. I don’t think that there’s anything in pop music that rises to the level of European classical music as much as that.
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older is perfect poetry. No other band has come close to the Floyd’s mastery of meter.
D at 78 —
That’s the ticket, many thanks. I like posting live vers. if at all possible. The young bassist does ok adding his chops to the bridge. Visuals hard to top, longer cut, it’s gilding the lily.
No time to check now, but I’m impressed with the “Atom Heart Mother” cut.
Mcohen at 80 —
Vinyl is off line, will have to research and advise on caravanserai.
Posted by: rufus magister | Feb 16 2015 13:00 utc | 84
Ouch!
“India Scraps Rafale Fighter Deal With France, Eyes Russian Alternative”
http://sputniknews.com/world/20150216/1018326220.html
Posted by: x | Feb 16 2015 13:25 utc | 85
Why doesn’t Cuba invite Russia to set up a communications R&D facility right next door to the USA torture black-spot at Gitmo Bay? Unfortunate by-product may be a communications black-out for much of the surrounding areas. If the current rent-a-fort sado-tenants have a problem with this then perhaps suggest they move out as soon as practical — and Fidel can even return their uncashed rent cheques as well.
“A Cuban foreign policy expert said that the recent visit of Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu to Cuba has shown that Cuba is interested in maintaining close ties with Russia regardless of the current state of its relations with Washington.
http://sputniknews.com/analysis/20150215/1018287738.html
Posted by: x | Feb 16 2015 13:35 utc | 86
A NYT article citing the successes of the CIA in purchasing chemical warheads in the midst of the Iraq war/insurgency. Maybe next time we just skip the war, and buy the damn things. I’m not an accountant, but something tells me it would be cheaper and there would be fewer angry people.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/world/cia-is-said-to-have-bought-and-destroyed-iraqi-chemical-weapons.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0
Posted by: IhaveLittleToAdd | Feb 16 2015 13:52 utc | 87
Rise in value of Swiss franc threatens workers in Eastern Europe with ruin
I saw this when it happened and hoped to see some explication here. Maybe there was some and I missed it. What’s the backstory to this?
Posted by: jfl | Feb 16 2015 14:14 utc | 88
@Demian Your lies about WW2 has never mattered, and never will.
Posted by: From Poland | Feb 16 2015 21:29 utc | 89
via voltaire.net
Obama trying to marginalize the intransigent anti-Syrians
by Thierry Meyssan
http://www.voltairenet.org/article186734.html
Posted by: crone | Feb 16 2015 22:30 utc | 91
Eric Zuesse, Gallup: Americans’ Fear of Russia Soars, cites a gallup poll, which is really just confirmation to the shepherds of their virtuosity with us sheep.
Note the orchestral cadence of their panpipes, as they flit about the sphere of their ‘enemies’. Like fireflies.
Every sheep a shepherd! No hope till its accomplished. At least a majority of us, to start.
Varoufakis is giving euro-leaders a chance for redemption, a chance to rethink their vision of Europe as a land of prosperity for banks, bondholders and creditors alone. He’s laid down the gauntlet saying that he will meet these lofty Masters of the Universe halfway or, perhaps, more than halfway; but he won’t abandon the working people who have suffered so dramatically under the present regime. He won’t submit to the ECB’s blackmail or give in to Germany’s threats. He’ll stick to his convictions and do what he promised to do because– as he says in his op-ed– “it is right”.
Greece Rejects ‘Absurd’ Eurozone Debt Deal
Eurozone finance ministers and Greek officials ended debt-restructuring negotiations in Brussels Monday night, leaving both sides pessimistic that a deal will be reached before a deadline at the end of next week.
A draft agreement offered by the eurozone proposed that Greece accept a six-month extension under the current bailout conditions. The proposal also insists that the International Monetary Fund remain involved with fincancial assistance to Athens, and that the new Greek government uphold reform commitments in “tax policy, privitization, labor market reforms, financial sector and pensions,” as imposed by its eurozone creditors.
One Greek official called the proposal “absurd and unacceptable,” adding that “there can be no agreement today.”
The Troika are still in denial, pedaling their tricycle around in circles.
Demian at 76, 78 —
Dark Side of the Moon is certainly the popular favorite, and with songs like “Breathe” and “The Great Gig in the Sky” there’s good reason for it. I’d have to go with Animals as my favorite album, for the subject matter, and the killer electric piano licks in several tracks. The tasty keyboard parts are certainly an element of their sound, as you note.
I touted “One of these Days” due to it’s technical experimentation (2x tracking of bass/w triplet delay says Wiki) which marks much of Meddle) and Gilmour’s guitar, esp. the slide. You described the work on “Fat Old Sun” as ecstatic, (will get to that later) I’d say a certain abandon characterizes Gilmour’s playing. And “One of these Days” exemplifies that well.
I’ll get in trouble for saying this — “The Wall” is not amongst their best work. For Waters as a songwriter, it’s certainly his summit. But the album did not move the band and it’s style or subject matter much beyond earlier forms. IMHO. “Comfortably Numb” is a classic, but not much else.
And the Floyd continued to do decent work after Waters left. “Learning to fly” and “The Turning Away” are certainly “Greatest Hits” level work. Waters tours “The Wall” regularly.
To conclude, a blast from the past, There’s No Way Out Of Here, from Gilmour’s first solo record. Features the late, great Raphael Ravenscroft (“Baker St.”) on sax.
FWIW, you should lighten up on mcohen, who’s said, they used to like the Floyd, but have moved beyond it. I think I recall you saying that about a few old faves of yours, Talking Heads, e.g. Given the Floyd’s rich palette, I found it hard to come to terms with it, but I’m coping.
ps — You are goofing about Dylan, right? Let’s cut to the chase here — best Dylan song ever, helped get the guy freed, apparently: Ruben “Hurricane” Carter. Violin piteously overlooked as a rock solo instrument.
Posted by: rufus magister | Feb 17 2015 1:51 utc | 94
You must watch the press conference with Yanis Varoufakis. In the nicest possible manner considering the circumstances, he describes how he was presented with a memorandum prior to the Eurogroup meeting that he found acceptable and was presented with a different and unacceptable memo, at Eurogroup head Jeroen Dijsselbloem’s instigation, at the top of the session. I don’t see Varoufakis as insinuated what Mason attributes to him, but it is certainly a logical inference that the Germans were behind this stunt.
Varoufakis reiterated he’d be happy to sign the older memo or a reasonable variant of it any time. He also does an impressive job of staying upbeat and on message under what have to be trying circumstances.
This is why I remain incredulous that Germany will play a different hand in Ukraine.
Posted by: Nana2007 | Feb 17 2015 1:53 utc | 95
Under the heading of Life Is War : The USA Has Weaponized Everything, Advanced Cybercrime Gang ‘Equation’ Closely Linked to NSA
Over the weekend, it was reported that the NSA was scrambling to get ready for a new “leak” about their operations, which was uncovered by a “non-US” cybersecurity company. Today, Russian-based Kaspersky Labs unveiled a huge cache of information about a cybercriminal gang they are calling “Equation,” and which appears to be tightly connected to the NSA itself.
Kaspersky Labs released a 44-page report on Equation (pdf), which describes the group’s suite of malware, used to steal information from industries, corporations, governments, and even some individuals, as the most advanced on the planet.
Posted by: jfl | Feb 17 2015 6:10 utc | 96
#94 rufus
hurricane another classic,neil young,s “harvest moon”….you ever listen to joe satriani……flying in a blue dream..or prof longhair,s big chief
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SINl5JY7LhI
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0IOyBwrvOKA
Posted by: mcohen | Feb 17 2015 6:10 utc | 97
CIA whistleblower calls for prosecution of officials responsible for torture
It was Zubaydah’s case that Kiriakou’s 2007 interview centered on. Basing himself on an internal CIA cable, Kiriakou admitted that the agency had once waterboarded Zubaydah, describing the practice as official government policy. In fact, that cable turned out to be false, and it has since been revealed that Zubaydah was waterboarded a total of 81 times in CIA “black sites.”
Moreover, last fall’s Senate torture report, which mentioned Zubaydah a total of 1,001 times, revealed that the agency used him as a “guinea pig” for developing its “enhanced interrogation” techniques after 9/11. Zubaydah’s lawyer says that he is the only detainee known to have been subjected to all of them. One procedure, developed after it was discovered that Zubaydah had a fear of bugs, involved locking him in a tiny “confinement box” filled with insects. His lawyer says that Zubaydah has suffered permanent brain damage from his ordeal and can no longer even recognize his parents.
The Obama administration finally admitted in 2011 that Zubaydah was neither a top Al Qaeda leader, nor a member of Al Qaeda, nor even “formally” identified with the organization. Nevertheless, the administration refuses to release him from Guantanamo Bay, where is held to this day without charges. Zubaydah’s unimportance was practically admitted by Kiriakou in his 2007 interview, when he told ABC News that “we didn’t go after him because he was Abu Zubaydah. We went after him because he just happened to be in Pakistan and we thought there was a chance we could catch him.”
When push came to shove John Kiriakou shoved back, and he has suffered for it. I am thankful that he stand up to the CIA. He was the first official to acknowledge the crimes of the Criminals In Action … this time.
And none of the people who did the crimes will ever be punished, if the CIA has any say in the matter … and so far they’ve had all the say in the matter. Especially via their sock-puppet, the Nihilist Nobel Peace Prize Candidate slash Champion of Torture.
Abu Zubaydah is still in Guantanamo.
Posted by: jfl | Feb 17 2015 6:38 utc | 98
lets quarantine this virus…
http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/02/sanctions-should-be-imposed-on-the-u-s/
Posted by: denk | Feb 17 2015 16:14 utc | 99
*The coup has been thwarted. Venezuela prevailed!
The army stood firmly by the government of President Maduro. Most of Latin America, including UNASUR, expressed both their solidarity and support.
But all over the world, life goes on, as if nothing significant really took place!
How much longer can such banditry by the Empire be tolerated?* [0]
*******************
washingtonblog offered 7 reasons for
* Why the “Bad Guys” Keep Winning* ?
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/12/bad-guys-winning.html
here’s no 8th, its the *progressives* stupid !
while uncle sham is committing genocides on a daily basis, where’r the murcun *activists* ?
well they fly all the way to beijing to protest against china’s *genocide railway* ! [1]
at a time when murkka is appropriating unesco certified natural
treasures in japan, sk, italy, philippines and turn these pristine
paradise into god damned military bases , where are the
murcun*enviromentalists* ?
hmm, they are busy agitating the nacaraguans against the chinese
sponsored canal project ! [2]
during the uncle sham engineered color rev in hk, guess what do
prominent murcun *progressives* like dave lindorff got to say about
his country’s latest imperialist skulldruggery ?
* we as Americans should be doing is demanding that
washington China stay out of Hong Kong’s
business * [cough cough] [3]
yeah right mr *progressive*, beijing should fuck off and let your cia/ned/usaid have a free hand yeah right*
with *progessives* like these…..
[0]
http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/02/sanctions-should-be-imposed-on-the-u-s/
[1]
*On Friday, three women from the United States, Canada and Britain
were detained after unfurling a banner at Beijing’s main train station reading, “China’s Tibet Railway, Designed to Destroy.”
Others planned to protest Saturday outside Chinese embassies
abroad.*
http://www.phayul.com/news/tools/print.aspx?id=13108&t=1
recall that the only olympics tarred with the label *genocide olympics*
was the 2008 event in beijing, uncle sham sent a gift to china for good measure, the bloody riots in llasha. !
[2]
protestors.
*chinese out of nicaraqua* !!!
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_68491.shtml
[3]
http://www.opednews.com/articles/2/The-Skinny-on-Hong-Kong-s-by-Jeff-J-Brown-Assassination_CIA_Capitalism_Chaos-141001-157.html
p.s.
reason no 9
damn washington blog censored my comment. !
Posted by: denk | Feb 17 2015 16:33 utc | 100