@83, pm, ‘The dollar has reserve status because the US is the only country in the World willing and able to run persistent trade deficits.’
isn’t that a circular argument … ‘The US is the only country in the World willing and able to run persistent trade deficits because the dollar has reserve status.’
if it loses reserve status it loses the ability to run persistent trade deficits. that will dry-up demand in a lot of the world, and put the usa in the same position it has put russia and iran with regard to re-industrializing, and – in the meanwhile – sucking up and making do.
the new system ought to be based upon something other than the expectation of infinite expansion. trees don’t grow to the sky.

Posted by: jfl | Jan 15 2017 5:05 utc | 103

Debsisdead 95
The make or break is the US Russia China. All else are peripherals. The US goes down, all its hangers-on are just bits of debris F UK ect ect. Until the US goes down, none of this shit like what is happening in Africa, MENA/middle east, or wherever will stop. Keep your eye on the foundation/power that supports what is happening, not the fancy trimmings around the edges.
Not to take away from your run down of what is happening in Gambia. From what I have read US is very active in that area of the world.

Posted by: Peter AU | Jan 15 2017 5:15 utc | 105

The Real Zionist Donald Trump invites deplorables to inauguration.:
https://sputniknews.com/world/201701151049604498-israeli-settlement-group-trump-inauguration/
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/israel-settler-groups-invite-donald-trump-inauguration-ceremony-yesha-council-jewish-settlements-a7525716.html
Will he invite Zionist spies too? Oh that’s right; they’re no longer necessary. No more secrets now that the takeover is complete. He’s really bending over for his Masters. Arrrrrgh!

Posted by: Circe | Jan 15 2017 5:46 utc | 107

Re: The President can’t pardon himself.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Jan 14, 2017 4:50:18 PM | 59
Trump won’t go after Obama – or Bill Clinton – it sets a bad precedent you know. Bad for him.
Hillary however, that’s a different matter.
He really must go after her.

Posted by: Julian | Jan 15 2017 6:01 utc | 109

jfl 108
The US (empire) is in the first stage of breakdown. The soviet union went through Gorbachov, Yeltsin, and then Putin emerged as a leader that was able to pull disparate peoples together to make the Russian federation a force able to withstand the US empire.
US is not the soviet union. Americans are very detached from reality, too much hollyweed.
Will Trump be the US leader that turns the US around? Being in so called reality tv and WWF, or whatever its called these days, he would understand the American psyche.
Where the US goes from here is anyone’s guess but so long as they are shooting the shit out of each other rather than the rest of the world, all’s good.

Posted by: Peter AU | Jan 15 2017 6:14 utc | 111

25
I’ll give you a talisman to carry for the next 106 days of Trumpocray aka, The Golden Trickle Down. That will be the privatization of Federal highways, military and government facilities and natural resource set-asides, just like Modi is doing, together with ‘The Wall’, (Modi’s version is ‘The Rupee’) a $35 BILLION ‘bicycling’ of National Treasury funds into private, (largely Israeli, as largest subcontractor to DHS in SW), Goldman bank accounts.
And that will only be the beginning. They have approved an additional $10 TRILLION in sovereigntized Fed Bank credit-debt, ironically, at the same time that Moody’s will pay a $437.5m fine to the Department of Justice, and the remaining $426.3m split between 21 US states, for lying about that same credit-debt! The bicycling success in Afghanistan, followed by the bicycling success in Ukraine, is now the cook book for all western central bank nations around the world. When faced with tax revenue starvation and loss of their salaries and pensions for life, Mil.Gov.Fed will BICYCLE!
95
The last couple of b’s posts have generated some of the best comments reading I can recall, and I resonated with your story of Gambia. I was in Cambodia, watching former Pol Pot leader Hun Sen as Prime Minister for Life, insist that all references to him be prefaced with ‘Samdech’, something equivalent to ‘Emperor’, have his goons murder anyone who spoke out, while he’s carving up the country into resource and power and real estate blocks being privatized by Chinese foreign capital, and the whole time old ‘glass eye’ is acting EXACTLY like Donald Trump does!
The Cambodian people are terrorized. Emotionally bleached. If you even broach politics, you are shushed, and then shunned. They’ve seen an entire city of people disappeared. There are monuments of bones and skulls. And that beautiful land is just being shattered by all the Chinese hot money like you wouldn’t believe, it’s like walking through Dachau in the ‘good old days’.
In exactly the same way, Trump’s hot money brigade will shatter USArya, as the wheels on that Great MAGA Bicycle go round and round, disappearing all national wealth into private bank vaults, leaving only national debt, and no Moody would dare to BBB the Treasury bond, even with more national debt (sic) than all nations on Earth, combined, and more debt (sic) than all nations in all of human history put together!! But USArya still has an AA+ (excellent) rating!
So I thought it was brilliant that Trump’s Senate has just proposed a $100,000 ‘minimum wage’ for the H1B Hindu high-tech ‘legal’ immigrants, while Trump is chewing that old rag doll about Mexicans and Muzzies and Deadbeat Students and Uninsureable Elders.
‘Sleepee?’ he asked. ‘You want sleepee? Just lie down on road. You get good long sleepee!’

Posted by: chipnik | Jan 15 2017 6:36 utc | 113

http://theduran.com/rosie-odonnell-calls-for-martial-law-in-the-usa-so-as-to-stop-trump-from-becoming-president/
who’s the fascist now ?

Posted by: alain | Jan 15 2017 6:41 utc | 115

guardian: Silk Road route back in business as China train rolls into London: After 16 days and 7,456 miles, the locomotive’s arrival heralds the dawn of a new commercial era.

Due to arrive on Wednesday, the train will have passed through China, Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany, Belgium and France before crossing under the Channel and arriving in the east end of London at Barking rail freight terminal.
Faster than a ship, cheaper than a plane, the East Wind won’t be quite the same train that left Yiwu on 2 January. Differing rail gauges in countries along the route mean a single locomotive cannot travel the whole route. But the journey still marks a new departure in the 21st-century global economy. The new train, which will start to run weekly while demand is tested, is part of China’s One Belt, One Road policy – designed to open up the old Silk Road routes and bring new trade opportunities, said Prof Magnus Marsden, an anthropologist at Sussex University’s School of Global Studies, who has been studying the trading patterns in Yiwu. China Railway has already begun rail services to 14 European cities, including Madrid and Hamburg. As a result, Yiwu’s markets are now loaded with hams, cheese and wine from Spain and German beer is available on every corner.
“It’s a new economic geography,” he said. “This is the first train to the UK, but very much part of a new type of commercial route. The commodities are small. It’s not the big corporates who will be using this train, so it’s very much in the tradition of the Silk Road, giving opportunities for those who are in fact the inheritors of those ancient traders today.”

Wednesday … new era

Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Jan 15 2017 7:25 utc | 117

Ottawa’s New Foreign Minister is’Catastrophic’ For Canada-Russia Relations
http://sptnkne.ws/dpMy
“The appointment of Chrystia Freeland is a ‘catastrophe’ for Canada’s relations with Russia, historian Michael J Carley told Radio Sputnik…”

Posted by: John Gilberts | Jan 15 2017 7:43 utc | 119

Apologies this is a long post, please skip on by, if uninterested. – Outraged.
@ Jackrabbit #175 & juliania previous thread #200
@ Jackrabbit, in many aspects though not all, by a long shot, that is predominantly succinctly put, yes 🙂
@ Juliania, thank you kindly. The traditional long term culture & general purpose of the dedicated posters at MOA is to inform, educate, research, analyze, assess, challenge, re-assess & re-evaluate, etc, in support of b’s posts, being the lead. Not by any means a typical nor average ‘social media’ forum. In case one may not have been aware of it’s genealogy & genesis.

… This is not real.
This new entity not only obstructs but charms, seduces, entices the mind, creates uncertainties, sounds like they know, they really know. Looks like a normal person having the same ordinary and likeable folksy ways. (If you prick me, do I not bleed?) Is fundamentally likeable.
“This guy murders people.” … My own sense of fairness will betray me. I will think: nobody could sound that good and be that evil. But that’s totally wrong. They can. They are.

Oh, dearest Juliania, you remind me so of R’Giap. Bravo! May FSM bless you 🙂
To reset the context re this specific topic, in this open thread:

Re-examine all that you have been told …
dismiss that which insults your soul.
– Walt Whitman.
The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore.” He continued “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
– re Karl Christian Rove

There is a clear obvious meaning, though it has always troubled me as being insufficient and incomplete.
Questions:
1. What is the Anti-Trump-Coup-Grouping(ATCG) trying to protect & defend & what is the wider meaning of all that has transpired since Trump first nominated for President ?
2. What is it that the ‘Bag-of-Deplorables’ are hoping for in committing to Trump & supporting his faction, in desperation & possibly faint hope ?
One proposes that the probable answer to both questions, is, the same. Even if one party, may have only understood it incompletely, subconsciously/experienced. Have a premise, that may also provide a simpler, clearer, Holistic explanation for most of what we have observed since Trump first entered the Presidential Race thru to today and moving forward.
(Brainstorming: In this instance to ‘enter a violent disturbance of the mind re held perception/understanding‘ and, concurrently to ‘creatively challenge/critic/assess/develop‘)
Disclaimers: Never paid much serious attention to the pre-election nominations or the actual election itself until that suddenly changed re a variety of certain, events, towards the latter portion of the campaigns. Considered as in the past, the election theatrics as a whole, nothing more than a faux play, a dark comedy ritual, signifying, nothing. All parties, all players and actors on the Stage.
Am no fan of Hillary/Clintons, etc(Killary? No explanation should be needed).
Am no fan of Trump! (a conman, arch-opportunist & lifelong grifter).
Therefore no ad-hominem, or partisan slanders/dissembling, etc, please. Not a conspiracist, so no thanks there too.
Premise:
The situation we are experiencing is truly unique, and the first time since 1933(in a much more minor & aborted manner) it has surfaced publicly.
The Anti-Trump-Coup-Grouping(ATCG) represents not the Deep State, but the ultimate owners and ultimate beneficiaries of the Military-Industrial-Corporate-Complex(MICC), first warned about in Eisenhower’s farewell speech in 1961. The MICC-O.
This is a taboo MSM & political topic and does not get any air by or from them.
The constant and ever compounding accumulation of ludicrous extraordinary wealth & ultimate Power/Influence, entirely above any National or international Laws. That is the ‘Investment’, which has grown beyond belief in the preceding ~71 years. That is what is being ‘Protected’, what is perceived to be under threat, that is what is behind and driving these events in totality. Political parties (Dem&GOP) are long suborned, merely but a faux illusion, along with the vast majority of career politicians, by MICC-O, the beneficiaries of the farce force upon us. The Deep-State exists, but is not the driver.
Hence why both Dem & GOP Congressman & Representatives are openly and determinedly in the ATCG.
Key elements of the Deep-State(being an interlinked series of agencies & offshoots & assets, grouped) are literally the mercenaries of the MICC’s beneficiaries. Their actions have become obvious and verifiable. Covert clandestine service elements who have lived wilful and corrupted lives in service of not the nation or Constitution nor Administration of any particular, but in service of the MICC-O. They are perfectly aware of the direct threat to their personal positions/benefits/rewards.
The neocons act as the ideological warriors and agent provocateurs of the MICC-O, seed and infiltrated throughout key positions/roles/agencies since hitting critical mass with Bush the younger.
Many agencies have not openly actively been identified as acting in support of the ATCG. Comey FBI, for example, where have the other agencies of the total of 17 been, … crickets … silence. Why ? They adhere to the traditional fraud of open and fair elections, and regardless of any personal partisan affiliations or views, honor the rituals. The same for the Military. Except where actively and directly suborned/directed by, Ash Carter(?), for example. In this respect the indoctrination in ‘unreal(?)’ yet mythical Values actually works against the MICC-O. I.e. Truth, Liberty, Justice, Apple Pie, Old Glory, The American Way, the Constitution, etc
Was Bush the Younger, Clinton the first, or Obama truly ever wholly executing the full power of Executive office independently, without undue influence and control ? One suggests not. Ah, but the Clintons are corrupt and take bribes from lobbyists and foreign agents/governments … yes, all true, it’s merely their on-the-side ‘hobby’, an abuse allowed them whilst fulfilling their appointed roles on the stage.
Hence, this farcical, reality TV show nutjob, with the awful fake tan and orange toupe, steps onto the stage. All those that matter dismiss, deride and ridicule the new cast member. Even key members of his own GOP party, and formerly the party organization itself, and ALL fellow nomination contenders, as a Gang, publicly.
Yet, after it all, the endless coverage by slander/demonization & omission, with polls manipulated to show Hillary with a 90% chance to win … on polling day, Trump and his faction, won.
*Gasp* the impossible has happened, send rioters (many paid) & provocateurs into the streets, along with everything we have seen since. Trump and his faction are readily dismissed by ‘everyone’, we are constantly reminded and re-assured … yet … they … won.
So, who are the ‘Bag-of-deplorables’ and what do they desperately, faintly dare hope to end ?
The MSM, corporations and bought and paid for politicians and neocons do not speak to them and are the opposite, diametrically, of their interests and desires for themselves, their children and their communities. The vast majority would likely not converse in these terms nor necessary clearly, with clarity, crystal or otherwise, yet they understand the effects and degradation of their parents lives, their own and their communities regarding the lived consequences of the last ~71 years within the US Domestic territories. And they no longer give a crap about faux identity politics, etc, as opposed to health, education and future prospects of their children, let alone shelter and food on the table. They live in fear of the Domestic US future, based on lived experience as, irrelevant, voiceless, outliers. Merely just another resource to be exploited.
And no, the MICC-O is not the Jews, nor are they the ultimate beneficiaries.
The Zionists are, IMHO, a foreign land based Uber-Aircraft carrier and associated assets, given largely free reign, as along as they fulfill their obligations to the MICC-O. Though with undue duplicitous access and infiltration of a corrupt political system to further their own direct interests, independently whenever possible. Suggest the MICC-O tolerates them, within defined limits. An exceptionally free, moderately independent vassal, but a vassal nonetheless.
So, in essence, Trumps faction called to them, and they answered. The MSM ommitted anything other than slander and demonization of it all. the ‘Bag-of-deplorables’ don’t exist, are not to be acknowledged and are to be denied a voice.
Is Trump legit, will his faction fulfill they’re faint desperate hopes ?
Given the MSM reporting, and the clear efforts across all social media by organized trolls, the answer is, no.
If that were true, and he and his faction, are supposed frauds (partially or entirely), why then the 18 months of ever increasing and desperate, since tossing his hat into the ring, efforts of the MICC-O, its agents and its minions to stop the Trump faction ascending at any and all cost ? Now having reached an irrational deafening multi-faceted crescendo … see SSCI Hearings announce PRIOR to Inauguration!
Seems logically implausible, if his faction were, as routinely declared by megaphone, already suborned, or a fraud. Does it not ? Is there an alternate, plausible explanation, that would hold water ?
Hence, we return to the ‘Polished Turd’, Rove. It is my proposition that he was not referring to our new Empire, he stated that openly, nor that we are all being distracted by a plethora of actions and flashing lights & fireworks, etc.
My proposition is that he, and the neocons, minions in service of the MICC-O, considered, at that point in time, that the MICC-O had reached ‘critical mass’ within the polity, institutions, economy, etc of the US as a formally, even if prior limited, sovereign, supposedly democratic republic and Nation State. Smarmy, egotistical narcissist that he is.
Hence, at that point in time and subsequently, the external exploitation of the rest of Terra, by any and all means, as well as the internal exploitation and degradation of US citizens lived lives and it’s economy, resources, assets, etc, were now destined to be strip-mined by the MICC-O. And none of ‘you'(he asserted), the watchers of shiny lights and events passing by, have even an inkling of what the Empire (an Agency), not the United States of America, not a mere faux Administration, then or future, could fathom or do anything about what would henceforth be achieved on behalf of the MICC-O, in total control, and with impunity.
Hence, why the incredible events we are currently living through, re a yet to commence, formally confirmed new Presidency and Administration, that, clearly, in the MICC-O’s interests, must be stopped, destroyed, by any and all means necessary, no matter the cost or consequences.
Apologies for the long post. Doubt if it could be avoided.

Re-examine all that you have been told …
dismiss that which insults your soul.
– Walt Whitman.

Thoughts ?
PS If you respond to the content, kindly keep it civil & reasonable, without faux partisan diatribe, Dems/GOP/Racial/Religious or otherwise, please.

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 8:15 utc | 121

Chinese New Year begin Sat Jan 28, end Sat. Feb 11. 2017. In China (PRC) it is Spring Festival. Traditionally Chinese New year period were 15-days. The first 3-days Chinese pay respect to family’s member begin with the elders, parent, in-laws and down to the lowest ranks. They also visit ancestors’ tombs and temples.
Chinese tradition does not permits visit frens during the first 3-days, only after the third days… Millions and million’s Chinese begin their yearly trek to ancestor, grandparent, parent and in-law homes.
From past experienced, major cities like Guangzhou, Shanghai, Beijing, HK plus a few cities most congested. These are gateways linking across thousands upon thousands Overseas Chinese heading the same yearly treks across the Pacific, Atlantic oceans and Taiwan strait.
Chinese New Years begin midnight Friday at 12am, fireworks go on till morning. Rich family will fire the biggest firework and non-stopped…..
I can add more, like red-package, burning joss-stick, dragon dances, customs on Chinese New year, etc…
Here vid clips rewards reading this post…..Trump’s granddaughter.
http://ijr.com/2016/11/737097-video-of-trumps-little-granddaughter-speaking-chinese-has-gone-viral-proving-even-children-are-fair-game-in-politics/
https://www.rt.com/viral/366924-trumps-granddaughter-poem-china/
Happy Chinese New Year to all Chinese MoAs

Posted by: OJS | Jan 15 2017 8:45 utc | 123

IS attacked Syrian army in Deir al Zor. For once French gov radio did not day “the regime soldiers”. What is next?

Posted by: Mina | Jan 15 2017 9:24 utc | 125

@ Posted by: Nur Adlina | Jan 15, 2017 4:31:07 AM | 128
Very well, Nur Adlina, your post asks questions in a rhetorical manner clearly implying knowing the answer to the questions asked.
Nur Adlina, enlighten those of us who are all ears, please, as to:

1. Who are (and(?)) what are the factions at odd with each other in control of the thing called America on the whole?
2. Who are the real ‘reality’ setters?

Cheers

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 9:47 utc | 127

@ Posted by: Kenny | Jan 15, 2017 4:51:13 AM | 130
Ah, Kenny, your ‘link’, Rolled-Comedy-Gold. lol
Actually, Not!
Are such ‘sites'(sic) really in your bookmarked list ?

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 10:02 utc | 129

@Outraged | Jan 15, 2017 5:02:39 AM | 131
Typically for you, you have chosen to try to slander me instead of addressing the substance of my post. You think that I should be grateful to you for not calling me a “troll”. This is reminiscent of Hillary claiming that Trump “hacked” the election to avoid addressing the content of her emails. In your case once again you instantly resort to ad-hominems and straw men to drive people away. What a piece of work you are.

Posted by: Kenny | Jan 15 2017 10:57 utc | 131

The members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence SSCI (115th Congress – Jan 03 2017 to Jan 03 2019)
Which will conduct Hearings on Russian Hacking of, and Intelligence activities re, the 2016 Election.

Senate Intel Committee to Question Trump Team Over Russia
Burr Threatens to Subpoena Trump Team to Testify

It is reported it not only will call members of the Outgoing Administration, but also proposed & already confirmed members of the upcoming New Administration.
Also reported(incorrectly?) by some MSM it will call before it both Barack Obama & Donald Trump ?!
Am unaware of a Senate Committee ever having attempted to attempt to question a sitting POTUS ? (Impeachment hearings as ‘trial’, after having been ‘Impeached’ by the House first, don’t count).
My understanding is the Senate does not have that power over a sitting President ?

Republicans:
Richard Burr, North Carolina, Chairman
(already announced intention to issue subpoenas to compel Trump team testimony)
Jim Risch, Idaho
Marco Rubio, Florida
Susan Collins, Maine
Roy Blunt, Missouri
James Lankford, Oklahoma
Tom Cotton, Arkansas
John Cornyn, Texas
Democrats
Mark Warner, Virginia, Vice Chairman
Dianne Feinstein, California
Ron Wyden, Oregon
Martin Heinrich, New Mexico
Angus King, Maine
Joe Manchin, West Virginia
Kamala Harris, California
Ex officio (Republicans)
John McCain, Arizona
Mitch McConnell, Kentucky
Ex officio (Democrats)
Jack Reed, Rhode Island
Chuck Schumer, New York

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 11:41 utc | 133

Less than a week left until Trump takes power,
will the hysteria end? Will it gradually cease?
There is this stain on Trump that MSM have put on him that forever seems to question his legitimacy.

Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 15 2017 12:16 utc | 135

@Ghostship | Jan 15, 2017 7:04:41 AM | 136
“various jihadist attempts to end the siege of East Aleppo, you will see plenty of SVBIEDs being used.”
Where does this constant stream of martyrs come from? Are all of their families being blackmailed? We hear from US propaganda that the “rebels” are all local Syrians desperate to shed themselves of Assad. Are these likely suicide bombers?
Or the narrative that they are devout jihadi’s horny for 70 virgins. If this is so then why has there been this massive increase in volume compared to Iraq in 2004-6? Is this new generation suddenly that more devout?
It is CIA mind control. It has been honed for the US in Fergueson and Baltimore, and if they fail in all other attempts it is likely to present its satanic head during the inauguration.

Posted by: Kenny | Jan 15 2017 12:34 utc | 137

Over a three hour period we had, first:

John Lewis: Trump is not a ‘legitimate’ president

CNN (16 hours ago)

Trump tweets on Lewis (shortly after above):

(Lewis) …should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart (not to mention crime infested) rather than falsely complaining about the election results. All talk, talk, talk – no action or results. Sad!

Then the Guardian runs this (19 hours ago almost immediately after the tweet):

Donald Trump starts MLK weekend by attacking civil rights hero John Lewis
the Guardian

The above ‘article’ is just one big hit piece. Finds, Dem, GOP & CIA(?) mouths to do so. A clean sweep.
This is like watching a tag-team, one-two punch, with the MSM Sources in different time-zones, different continents and owned by ‘different'(?) corporations … astounding

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 12:48 utc | 139

Re: Posted by: Cresty | Jan 15, 2017 7:31:39 AM | 138
It wasn’t Syria/ Assad that used Chemical Weapons – that story was total BS made up and propagated by the MSM. Fake News as we would now call it.
Start from there.
Here, let me send you a link to see that was the case:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10039672/UN-accuses-Syrian-rebels-of-chemical-weapons-use.html
Once you understand the whole “Assad crossed Obama’s ‘red line’ by using Chemical Weapons” story is BS you can start chipping away at any other beliefs.
But really hammer that point – there is absolutely no evidence Assad ever used Chemical weapons. None – in fact, he gave all his Chemical Weapons up!
Don’t concede on that point until you win the argument – then move onto the next thing.
That’s where to start.
Oh, and throw in Iraqi WMDs as well – so why is it you trust CIA/MI5/Mossad again??? Why is it given their terrible record, why are the right “this one time”.
Why? Why? Why?

Posted by: Jules | Jan 15 2017 13:08 utc | 141

@Peter AU
Another train … exposing the conflict zones within Europe:
○ The Belgrade – Mitrovica Express

Posted by: Oui | Jan 15 2017 13:48 utc | 143

The Trump Dossier Puts the Deep State in Deep Doo-Doo
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/01/the_trump_dossier_puts_the_deep_state_in_deep_doodoo.html

Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 15 2017 13:59 utc | 145

Esplosion in Israeli airbase. “Might” (?) be retaliation by Hezbollah. Any reliable source/confirmation?
https://dimpenews.com/2017/01/14/israel-explosion-sur-la-base-militaire-de-hatzor-est-elle-une-reponse-du-hezbollah-pour-pour-mazzeh/

Posted by: Giovanni Dall'Orto | Jan 15 2017 14:29 utc | 147

@ Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 15, 2017 8:59:38 AM | 147
A lesson from Good ol’ Boy, Pres Lyndon B Johnson seems appropriate, in how to smash an opponent:

Legend has it that LBJ, in one of his early congressional campaigns, told one of his aides to spread the story that Johnson’s opponent f*cked pigs.
The aide responded “Christ, Lyndon, we can’t call the guy a pigf*cker. It isn’t true.”
To which LBJ supposedly replied “Of course it ain’t true, but I want to make the son-of-a-bitch deny it. In public!“

@ Posted by: jfl | Jan 15, 2017 9:17:07 AM | 148
Periodically speed scan titles on Trumpster in a sequential timeline re release to look for trends or standouts, noting, sources, etc. The MSM is as one in the slanders, regardless of the owner, or the type of paper or the time-zone or the country … have never in all my years seen anything even remotely comparable.
It’s as if the Guardian article had been written in advance with CNN, then, upon his tweet being published, that text was insereted in a central paragraph and the article promptly published ! I shit you not! It and other patterns are astounding. WSJ seems to be trying to be neutral/objective and a few others, but they’re swamped by the other 90-95% of sources. Remarkable.

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 14:33 utc | 149

Cresty
Try that
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/americas-failure-russia-success-in-syrias-war
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2011/bhadrakumar080611.html
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-140613.html
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/nov/04/syria-iran-great-game
https://mobile.twitter.com/ehsani22
https://janoberg.me/2016/12/25/the-destruction-of-eastern-aleppo-syria/
https://janoberg.exposure.co/aleppos-evil-humanitarians
https://janoberg.exposure.co/humans-in-liberated-aleppo
http://whoghouta.blogspot.fr/
http://acloserlookonsyria.shoutwiki.com/wiki/Category:Chemical_Weapons
https://theintercept.com/2015/06/03/isis-forces-exbaathist-saddam-loyalists/
http://m.spiegel.de/international/world/a-1029274.html

Posted by: Mina | Jan 15 2017 14:45 utc | 151

@151 or
yeah. but the guardian is a british newspaper. wtf?
goes to show that – like the 1% – the TransNational-Corporate MainStream-Media are aptly named, no?
i don’t follow the tnc msm, so i appreciate your vantage point. i think they’ve confused their echo chamber with something that people pay attention to. won’t surprise me when the inauguration goes just as did the vote of the electoral college. i do hope that tee-rump kills the cia, at least. i do hope it/they don’t reach their four score and ten. he’s got till 26 july to ‘put them down’, right?
he’ll probably just send new bodies into the belly of the beast. they’ll pass like lumpy rats through the digestive system of the snake.

Posted by: jfl | Jan 15 2017 14:47 utc | 153

Another U turn by Hollande or just daily cynicism? Yesterday he said in Bamako:
“Mali has provided a lesson for the “international community” and “martyred peoples” in Syria, Iraq and Libya, he added.”
http://allafrica.com/stories/201701140236.html

Posted by: Mina | Jan 15 2017 14:52 utc | 155

http://europe.newsweek.com/robert-mercer-trump-donor-bannon-pac-523366?rm=eu
http://www.townandcountrymag.com/society/news/a9204/rebekah-mercer-donald-trump-transition/
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/rebekah-mercer-donald-trump-231693
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/19/us/politics/robert-mercer-donald-trump-donor.html
The two elephants in the Trump’s room.

Posted by: ThatDamnGood | Jan 15 2017 14:54 utc | 157

@149 giovanni, @152 or
Hatzor Air Force Base

Posted by: jfl | Jan 15 2017 14:58 utc | 159

@ 151
With the British press, the BBC was brought down reporting Tony Blair’s WMD shenanigans with the death from suicide by butter knife of a well respected expert (a Sr. moment doesn’t bring back the Dr.’s name), and The Guardian received a noted visit from MI5/MI6/SAS goons for reporting Wikileaks/Assange collections. The probability of actual information being received through the British media comes from either the centre-right/hard right business institutions or from salacious Red Top Tabloid press, neither having been honoured with visits from the aforementioned authorities. In total, with British sources, caveat emptor applies in full measure. Last date British press and integrity were in contact ended about the time of the 2nd Gulf War and has become litter-box liner since. YMMV

Posted by: Formerly T-Bear | Jan 15 2017 15:02 utc | 161

@ Posted by: Noirette | Jan 15, 2017 9:53:42 AM | 158
Outstanding. Many points covered separately in last week, in isolation. Great succinct summation. 🙂
Unequivocally agree Egypt has been lost as vassal, moving back toward Russia, pre ’73, after they forced the Muslim Brotherhood upon them as one of the ‘Arab Spring’ colored Ops.
Russia-China are seriously economically linked now, and the facets will only increase at pace. Agree, delusional to think they can be split …

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 15:11 utc | 163

@Cresty | Jan 15, 2017 7:39:46 AM | 140
Cannon fodder <> suicide bomber
Think of the millions who died during the first world war for Israel. They were certainly cannon fodder but the vast majority were not willing to strap on a suicide belt. I don’t think there is a really is a precedent in history to these tactics unless someone considers Janissaries who were mind controlled from infancy anyway.
Even in Palestine and Gaza we don’t see this mass suicidal display. Perhaps I should pay more attention to Jihadi social media, but I think getting people to kill themselves is not as simple as getting Saudi princes to do suicidal things in their Ferrari’s.

Posted by: Kenny | Jan 15 2017 15:19 utc | 165

@ Posted by: Formerly T-Bear | Jan 15, 2017 10:02:02 AM | 163
Yes, MI6 is always throwing their ‘D-Notices’ around, and then turn around and ask ever so nicely, “Now publish this for us will you, as asmall favor, be a nice chap, what ?” Perfidious Albion has always been such.
Re the Guardian, have noticed a major shift to literally Mirroring the NYT, CNN, WaPo over the last three years … on any geopolitical articles, Rabid on Syria, Russia, and the rest, just ridiculous. It is as if they changed ownership … can’t find anyhting hard … however, whenever one occasionally comments on their forums and inquires if their has been a change of ownership … moderators, instantly delete … make of that what you will …
Their ultimate owner is now hidden behind an opaque trust … Multiple suspect masking shell companies probably beyond that ?
Please accept my apologies re forgetting about the IT Sec discussion/advice … events … have, ah, gotten in the wa.y
Will try to write up something accessible to a broad audience (various levels of tech knowledge/literacy) when one gets the opportunity.

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 15 2017 15:27 utc | 167

In a sign of the different attitude of US President-elect Donald Trump, the West Bank settlers’ council said Friday it has been invited to send a delegation to the presidential inauguration next week.
It said that Oded Revivi, chairman of the Yesha settlers’ council, will lead the delegation. He will be joined by Benny Kasriel, mayor of Ma’aleh Adumim, a large settlement next to Jerusalem.
Revivi said the invitation is a “clear indication” that the new administration understands the importance of his group. He says he is looking forward to working “with our new friends in the White House.”
Trump has appointed David Friedman, a Jewish-American lawyer with close ties to the settlement movement, as his ambassador to Israel. Trump also has vowed to move the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a step the Palestinians strongly oppose.
Trump has assured Israel that things will be different after he takes office, and a day after his election victory, and has invited Netanyahu to meet with him in the United States “at the first opportunity.”

http://www.timesofisrael.com/settler-leader-delegation-to-attend-trump-inauguration/
So IOW, Trump is thumbing his nose at the Geneva Conventions, trying to legitimize illegal West Bank squatters by giving them the most important global platform to violate International Law and is therefore complicit with their crime.
I see that the hypocrisy continues as rabid Trump supporters here are completely ignoring this news like its kryptonite. Of course, there is no way to spin this shit. This exposes the REAL Donal Trump and that’s why many of you can’t touch it. There is no way to defend this. Trump is ruled by his Zionist masters that will surround him in office; he is elevating the deep state to where it has never been before with the Machiavellian Zionist criminal Kissinger pulling his strings.
You are counting down the days here as if Trump is about to descend on a cloud and make the world a great place when clearly he is already demonstrating he has been suborned by Zionists and is pledged to the deep state more than any other President to date!

Posted by: Circe | Jan 15 2017 15:31 utc | 169

@Circe | Jan 15, 2017 10:31:35 AM | 171
And Trump’s pick for Treasury (Mnuchin) is also strong evidence that something is not what it appears with him. We won’t go into his family. I am waiting to see if he appoints a chosenite as head of IRS. At that point his true colors will be completely on display.

Posted by: Kenny | Jan 15 2017 16:01 utc | 171

@ jfl | Jan 14, 2017 11:37:25 Thanks.
Let’s if that coming Paris meeting brings any positive change.

Posted by: ProPeace | Jan 15 2017 16:51 utc | 173

@138 cresty.. try to copy and paste the picture in the link i offered @118 and give it to them without a word..
@140 cresty.. indeed.. saudi arabia emptied their jails to anyone who wanted a one way ticket to syria.. more love and kindness coming out of that good friend of the usa’s…

Posted by: james | Jan 15 2017 17:26 utc | 175

Some interesting daily news to ponder:
JUST IN: 6 REPUBLICANS TOOK SECRET PAYMENTS FROM CLINTON TO DESTROY TRUMP – USA NEWS TODAY
Andrea Bocelli backs out of singing at Trump’s inauguration after receiving death threats | Daily Mail Online
EDWARD SNOWDEN GETS 1 MILLION SIGNATURES FOR PARDON: Obama Should Pardon Edward Snowden – InvestmentWatch
The Clinton Foundation Is Shutting Down The Clinton Global Initiative
U2 delays new album release due to the election of Donald Trump because the world is now ‘in a different place’ than when the songs were written
George Soros: The Man Behind the Mayhem
For $8,000 this startup will fill your veins with the blood of young people
Actor Zoe Saldana speaks out: Hollywood bullied Trump — Society’s Child — Sott.net
Israeli tank fires on besieged Gaza Strip — Puppet Masters — Sott.net
Bizarre cluster of deaths strike soldiers assigned to Fort Hood Army base; 12 dead in 2 months — Society’s Child — Sott.net

Posted by: ProPeace | Jan 15 2017 17:36 utc | 177

@173
Why lower the bar for Trump exclusively? Why move the goal post to yet another suspect and, in this case, despicable act that proves he’s a fraud, and then give him another chance? Already, there’s sufficient proof. How can inviting a criminal organization to the inauguration be dismissed as if it’s nothing? This is an in-your-face, unprecedented mockery of the law. If any other Republican candidate had surrounded himself with this cabinet fully representing the MIC, Wall Street, and Zionism) with Kissinger in his shadow cementing his criminal legacy, and that President-elect having already made moves enabling Zionist criminals by trying to sabotage a U.N. Resolution and legitimizing a crime against International Law that everyone globally agrees is a crime by giving the criminals such a prestigious platform; would you hold back your criticism of that incoming President? Be honest. Everyone here would be up in arms in revolt and firing criticism on all cylinders!
Is it his celebrity, his fake bombast of draining the swamp during the campaign or his pseudo-detente with Russia that justify undermining any criticism of him? Even the fact that he takes on the media because it’s inconvenient for his image is not grounds for failing to hold his feet to the fire. Example of his double-standard: he put Comey down when he failed to bring charges against Hillary and praises him for publicly bringing up an investigation into Weiner’s computer that could contain Hillary email and he does the same thing with media outlets. This is a man who only cares about ambition, power and ego. If the press criticize him, they’re corrupt; if they praise him; they’re great. He takes them on only because they’re inconvenient. The fact that the press was exposed as corrupt is no tribute to him; they are both exposed as corrupt. These are two corrupt sides of the same coin exposing themselves as equally dirty as they wrangle in the mud. This says nothing about his integrity; only that he has no integrity. He has no moral compass. This man despises dissent; and is already abusing his power. He’s a total fraud and deep-state-owned and boy did Zionists get their money’s worth!

Posted by: Circe | Jan 15 2017 18:18 utc | 179

Re: Trump going after Hillary
Campaign rhetoric is just that and always has been. In that respect, Trump is no different than any other. If they don’t directly promise and backtrack then they (and the media) will imply or sell the impression. Party faithful latch on to what they like.
Hence:
“I don’t want to hurt them. They’re good people,” Trump said about the Clinton family during his November 13 interview, his first as president-elect.

Posted by: Curtis | Jan 15 2017 19:02 utc | 181

104
You clearly don’t know who you are talking to:
Trump is the One who Knocks, and his poodled Congress
just handed him a $10 TRILLION zirconium credit card.
It’s 100% Republican now, Executive, Legislative
and Judicial, with a real bad attitude, tearing
around Manhattan, wearing a brand-new Trump suit.
The DNC are merely the gribbles living within Tower
of Babbel, that is the $3,400,000,000 One Party of
Mil.Gov.Fed, the 99.4% unelected, unappointed Him.
USArya is a Freedom and Democracy Cult!
I used to, briefly, work as a deprogrammer for the
Guru Maharaji accolytes. Their eyes were blank and
hollow, just like Red-Blue Tinfoil. Finally had to
stop, for, as their eyes cleared, my eyes cleared
also, once I had realized it wasn’t just the GMs,
or the Hari Krishna’s, it was all of howling mad
USArya, land of the Shakers and Holy Rollers, eyes
upturned, rolled back, waiting for the Grey Aliens
to land with a refreshing drink of warm Kool-Aid.
USAra’s future is its past. It will be strip-mined.
There will be no opposition, only facile, teenage
Baldwinium imitators, a constant conspiracy theory,
which just serves as relentless free re-branding, as
constant stress-positioning and emotional bleaching.
And Trump doesn’t have to pay a single red pfennig!

Posted by: chipnik | Jan 15 2017 20:59 utc | 183

|@ Debsisdead | Jan 14, 2017 10:53:02 PM | 95
Some considerations about what is and what isn’t the bullying of ad hominem and why – from your comment’s content.
A trend can be noted over time, half a century ago a wag observed in academia, academics were learning more and more about less and less. Today that wag would likely observe the public knowing less and less about more and more – and get applauded for astute perception. There is likely an acute direct relationship between a word and its meaning, it is what powers professional training, its absence can in itself explain the dismal record of the dismal science of economics where words and their meanings have become fungible, like the Red Queen informing Alice that words mean what she, the Queen wants them to mean. Ad hominems are such accusation, meaning only what the accuser wants them to mean, devolved from definite definition. This is a defect of definition.
There is also, following the wag’s observation of the population knowing less and less about more and more, a very real degeneration in the use of (the English) language itself, most likely attributable to the decadence of the educational system itself. A recently acquired (New) Compact Oxford English Dictionary (ISBN 978-0-19-861022-9) has a curious inclusion – Effective English (of 43 pages) – of particular note a section on sentences which may be useful for those using English as 2nd (or +) language and a refresher for native speakers – as follows:

* Sentences
A sentence is a group of words that makes complete sense [statement], contains a main verb, and begins with a capital letter and ends with a full stop (or the equivalent such as a question mark or an exclamation mark).
There are three basic kinds of sentence:
* A simple sentence normally contains one statement: [example omitted].
* A compound sentence contains more than one statement, normally joined by a conjunction such as and or but: [example omitted].
* A complex sentence is made up of parts called clauses. There is a main clause and one or more subordinate clauses which usually tell you more about the main clause. For example these could take the form of a conditional clause beginning with if or a relative clause introduced by which or who: [example omitted].
Getting words in the right order
The normal order of the key elements of an English sentence is[:] subject – verb – object:
|……Kate………had seen……..something unusual……….[original changed for brevity]
|…[subject]…….[verb]……………..[object]

All too often native speakers confound the subject with the object when confronted with assertion, mistaking themselves as being the object of assertion; I suspect those having English as 2nd or greater language are much more careful in this regard. Once defensive emotions arising over misunderstanding occur, all possibility to communicate disappears. This has the possibility to be contained should the actual intent of the assertion be correctly determined by the recipient but intent is totally under the control of the speaker, what the speaker intends, never ever controlled by the listener, at least listeners maturing beyond early teenage adolescence; incumbent on the listener is assessment, interpretation and conclusions reached of what the speaker has presented and whether to agree or disagree with that understanding. The faults may lay with either party in the giving or receiving information but seldom do actual ad hominems occur other than a devise to curtail communication. Though I may state something poorly, which I likely often do, I shall never be responsible for whatever transpires between the listener’s ears and will certainly never apologise other than for my own failures, the listener be ‘not worth the candle’. It still surprises when a putative adult commentator here chooses to indulge such childish reply, but then there are exceptional people everywhere it seems.

Posted by: Formerly T-Bear | Jan 15 2017 22:32 utc | 185

Outraged@123
Forgive me for what may seem an obtuse question, but could you refresh my memory as to when Carl Rove
made that comment? I ask because it seems to me context is very important in assessing these statements.
When I was first having babies (don’t ask – way, way back) I realized that the thing about all baby advice books
was that every one of them, and all of them different, were correct – under certain circumstances. But because
all babies are different, and every environment in which one is raised is different, the books will be correct
some of the time.
And before we go on, here’s one point, maybe minor. You say:
“,,, it’s merely their on-the-side ‘hobby’, an abuse allowed them
whilst fulfilling their appointed roles on the stage.”
I would submit, and no doubt be called naive, that it is those ‘abuses’ which distinguish the ‘deep/dark’
players. It’s how much they have cast aside ‘the angels of their better nature.’ They are slightly
non-human because of it, and it is that non-humanity which the present system feeds off of.
Now, does Trump have this non-humanity? Many seem eager to say he does, but I’m not
sure. I’ll tell you what’s the marker for me. It’s killing other human beings. Bush had it
in spades – how? From denying clemency when he was governor to so many death row
inmates on the way to execution. The Clintons have it from their actions in Haiti, and
then Hillary in Libya. It’s a simple judgment for me – I don’t want anyone who has
unnecessarily murdered people by their own actions or inactions leading this country.
It’s a main reason I cannot stand, haven’t been able to stand, Obama’s presence in
our national discourse. I haven’t and won’t call him president, ever, even though I did
originally vote for him as an untried young man I thought was more intelligent than
ever to be talked into doing such a thing. He wasn’t. I was wrong.
Sorry if that isn’t to your main point – basically that was a good reprise of what we currently
face, though. Thank you.

Posted by: juliania | Jan 15 2017 23:27 utc | 187

@184 nonsense factory.. nice response to all that.. i liked my link in response to cresty which i posted @118 initially – here
along the lines of the levantreport you shared, but a much more condensed version with pic..

Posted by: james | Jan 16 2017 0:37 utc | 189

Outraged@191:
Thanks. Here’s why I asked about the Rove quote. Example: my oldest son when very young had his first visit to the dentist, just a check up we thought, and it was a children’s dentist as well. (Back in the day when a visit to the dentist didn’t cost an arm and a leg.) Came home and I was horrified to see his two perfectly fine baby teeth had been extracted. My husband said that when he asked, or rather accosted, the dentist the reply was “Just moving things along; they were going to be coming out anyway”. My point: that was that dentist’s reality, not ours. He lost my son as a patient right at the getgo. His reality was crazy and as parents we weren’t buying it. It was too abrupt.
People do need to be coaxed, lured into ‘the new reality’. That’s not happening now. The reality timeline has been, for whatever reason, thrown out of whack, and forgive me, but I’ll point to Putin. He was supposed to respond way back during the reworking of Ukraine. He was supposed to respond with aggression. The powers that be were aiming for that; they had all their ducks in a row to then ‘respond’ to his aggression and paint him as the enemy. He didn’t. So, new plan. Voices become strident. Whatever they do, he’s got a COUNTERmove that people in general like. He’s not only holding back; he’s got Lavrov! These guys look like statesmen, and they’ve got the people behind them. Darn it, he’s glitching the new reality. And, he’s getting better at it. ENEMY!
As just a non sequitur I’ll comment on the Fenelon quote to this extent, extracting the following phrasing:
” As a family is to the nation, so is the nation to the universal commonweal; wherefore it is infinitely more harmful for nation to wrong nation, than for family to wrong family.”
I don’t see the logic of the ‘wherefore’ since I would say it is AS harmful for nation to wrong nation as it is for family to wrong family, or indeed individual to wrong individual. I think you start with the smaller relationships and do the Buber thing,(I and Thou) in order to make sense of being part of humanity as a whole and seeing what the values are there. It might be a godlike thing to look in the other direction, but we are not gods – yet. And it’s maybe rather dangerous to think we are. But maybe I am doing Fenelon an injustice because I haven’t read anything else of his/hers.
Sorry, time for cricket!

Posted by: juliania | Jan 16 2017 1:11 utc | 191

@ Posted by: juliania | Jan 15, 2017 8:11:11 PM | 194
Re Fenelon, ’tis formal Olde English from 1700’s, meanings change or can be misconstrued by the modern reader.
Yes, Indeed. The ‘Evil Russkies’ have repeatedly demonstrated support for the real tenets and values of International Law, Diplomacy and Statesmanship. The Sheeple have noticed as well as many nations government re the comparisons.
Lavrov also has a wicked sense of humor, in private, there are some rare relevant youtube clips/interviews 😉
Cheers
@ Posted by: Debsisdead | Jan 15, 2017 8:53:06 PM | 195
As we have discussed many times … the result of the rapacious, ravenous, soulless, ‘Old Grey haired Men’ … 🙁

Posted by: Outraged | Jan 16 2017 2:18 utc | 193

@153 Mina @177 James, Thank you
I’m afraid some people will never shed their belief of Assad as an evil butcher, at least not until he’s a mutilated corpse, Kaddafi style, but at least people who witness the discussion may be persuaded.

Posted by: Cresty | Jan 16 2017 7:12 utc | 195

Cresty
Try that
https://twitter.com/maytham956
these pics show brainwashed people that it is not and was not North Korea

Posted by: Mina | Jan 16 2017 11:33 utc | 197

Dr Udo Ulfkotte, the former German newspaper editor whose bestselling book exposed how the CIA controls German media, has been found dead. http://yournewswire.com/german-newspaper-editor-exposed-cia-dead/#disqus_thread

Posted by: Daisee | Jan 16 2017 15:43 utc | 199