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‘Dirty Record’: Brazil’s Coup Leader Temer Banned from Politics for 8 Years

Sputnik – 03.06.2016

In the first two weeks of temporary leadership, leaked recordings have traced the interim government to a coup conspiracy against Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and now the country’s interim leader is barred from running for office for nearly a decade.

On Thursday, a regional election court in Sao Paolo issued a guilty verdict against interim Brazilian President Michel Temer on election law violation charges, and declared the politician ineligible to run for political office for eight years as a result of having a “dirty record.”

The court determined that Temer, the subject of several other corruption investigations, spent personal funds on his election campaign in excess of campaign finance limits. The interim leader is now barred from running for the office he currently occupies, underscoring the illegitimacy of his administration.

From the beginning, Temer’s installation into power by means of the impeachment proceedings against Dilma Rousseff was considered by Brazilians to be a coup by corrupt politicians seeking to oust a leader who intended to hold them to justice.

That truth was revealed shortly after Rousseff was suspended from office, when newspaper Folha da Sao Paolo released audio recordings implicating top cabinet officials and allies of the Temer administration plotting the ouster of the democratically-elected leader, in order to avoid criminal charges connected to the “Car Wash” investigation into illegal kickbacks traced to state-owned oil giant Petrobras.

The first series of tapes featured Romero Juca, the country’s planning minister and the head of the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB), speaking with oil executive Sergio Machado about “putting Michel into power” in order to “stop the bleeding” associated with the investigation.

The influential minister immediately offered his resignation once the recordings were released, but the damage had already been done to Temer’s attempts to cast the impeachment proceedings as anything other than a coup. Notably, Temer, along with the two key actors in the impeachment process – former lower house leader Eduardo Cunha and senate leader Renan Calheiros – all belong to the PMDB party.

One week later, the newspaper released a new round of recordings featuring Temer’s transparency minister, Fabiano Silveira, advising senate leader Renan Calheiros on how to obstruct the Car Wash investigation. Brazil’s transparency minister holds responsibility for all government anti-corruption efforts, illustrating that the interim administration is akin to a fox guarding a hen house.

Despite growing chants by Brazilians for “Fora Temer” (out with Temer) and “Golpista” (leader of the coup), the interim government has speedily started to undo a decade and a half of democratically-supported social reforms.

On day one, Temer announced a new austerity regime, featuring large cuts to social services for poor Brazilians. Not long after, newly-minted Foreign Minister Jose Serra declared the country would transition away from regional economic collaboration and partnerships, toward an open-market US-centric deregulated-trade policy that has led working class Brazilians to fear economic exploitation.

In a final measure against supporting a social safety net, Temer declared the elimination of the country’s entire cultural ministry, citing costs related to bridging gaps among Brazil’s diverse diaspora.

The fate of Brazil now rests in the hands of the country’s sporadically violent senate, which will vote in six months following the completion of the upcoming impeachment trial on whether to oust Rousseff from office permanently. Rousseff’s opponents will need a 2/3 vote (54 of 81 members) to complete their coup, with the results of those proceedings expected to be decided by a razor thin margin.

In May, Brazilian senators voted 55 to 22 to advance impeachment proceedings against President Rousseff. The vote was taken under a circus-like atmosphere, with senators using their speaking time not to discuss impeachment proceedings, but rather to beg Brazilians to support reelection bids. In an absurd debate that featured fistfights, references to God, the Devil and gangrene, a highlight of the proceedings was Renan Calheiros’s tooth falling out of his mouth on live television.

The senate vote was nearly canceled after former lower house leader Eduardo Cunha, recognized as the chief architect of the impeachment effort, was ousted by the Brazilian Supreme Court on corruption charges. His successor, Waldir Maranhao, called for an annulment of the lower house vote during his first day in office, citing procedural irregularities, although many believe his opposition was traced to rumors that Cunha bribed legislators to support the impeachment vote.

The acting lower house leader quickly rescinded his calls for annulment after threats that he would be deposed from office and a direct challenge by senate leader Renan Calheiros who said the vote would proceed regardless of Maranhao’s objections. A constitutional crisis loomed in the South American nation.

A regime in which over 2/3 of its members face corruption charges, outed as participants in a coup, impeached their leader, Rousseff, who faces no corruption charges, but, with the audacity of the Temer administration’s crimes against Brazil reaching a fever pitch, it may only be days or weeks until the interim government collapses.

June 3, 2016 Posted by | Corruption | , , | Leave a comment

Unpopular and scandal plagued, what legitimacy does Brazil’s interim government have to impose painful cuts?

The BRICS Post | June 1, 2016

Brazil’s interim government, led by former vice president Michel Temer, is facing a serious credibility crisis. Two ministers were dismissed in the first few weeks after leaked audio appeared to show them conspiring to stifle the ongoing Petrobras corruption investigation.

Meanwhile, Temer’s administration is trying to pass a budget through congress calling for limits on health, education and social spending, defended as bitter but necessary measures to get Brazil’s flailing economy back on track.

But what legitimacy does Temer’s unelected government have to impose cuts that will seriously affect tens of millions of mainly poor and lower income Brazilians?

Temer’s rise to presidency illustrates Brazil’s acute political dysfunction. More than two dozen parties form often flimsy favour swapping coalitions to gain and maintain power.

Temer’s Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) – of no fixed ideology that historically latches onto whoever is in power – was allied to President Dilma Rousseff’s left leaning Worker’s Party (PT). Hence how Temer became vice president.

Weeks before Rousseff’s first impeachment vote, after a 13 year coalition in which the PMDB gained coveted ministerial positions, the party split from Rousseff’s government, essentially allying with the opposition. Temer, by all accounts, played an active role in Rousseff’s downfall.

Rousseff and her supporters call the impeachment process a “coup.” Accused of manipulating government finances to hide a growing deficit ahead of her 2014 re-election, she is currently suspended and awaits impeachment trial at the senate that will most likely lead to her permanent ouster.

Whether Rouseff’s impeachment constitutes a coup or not is widely debated. However dubious, it happened through a legal process.

But now, unpopular and otherwise unelectable Temer is pushing through reforms to roll back Brazil’s social safety net, measures that clearly wouldn’t receive popular support through vote.

Data polls suggest 60 per cent of voters wanted Rousseff impeached, a weak president and poor manager, who presided over Brazil’s worst recession in decades. Yet only 2 per cent would actually vote for Temer and 58 per cent wanted him impeached too.

In fact, 60 per cent want new elections, only plausible if Temer resigns or is forced to stand down. Temer could be impeached on the basis that as Rousseff’s vice, he also broke budget laws. He could also be removed by the electoral court if it’s proven that his and Rousseff’s election campaign received funds from construction firms embroiled in the Petrobras scandal.

So far he has been mentioned in plea bargains relating to the scandal but nothing has stuck. However, Marcelo Odebrecht – chief of one of the main firms involved – has reportedly signed a long awaited plea bargain, which could see many more heads roll in Brasilia.

Temer called for a “government of national salvation.” He famously installed a conservative leaning, all white male cabinet; burying Brazil’s ideal – however illusionary – of being a “rainbow nation” or “racial democracy.” What’s more, at least a third of the chosen ministers are accused of corruption.

Within a week, ministers were talking about shrinking the health system and saying no constitutional right is absolute. Temer even had to warn them to think before speaking.

The scandalous audio leaks began with planning Minister Romero Juca apparently discussing Rousseff’s impeachment as a way to stop the Petrobras investigation. He was suspended.

Next, Temer’s anticorruption Minister Fabiano Silveira stood down after audio revealed him giving advice on dealing with prosecutors to senate president Renan Calheiros, a powerful honcho of Temer’s PMDB party, target of multiple investigations.

In the middle of the leaks, the budget that involves cuts to health, education and social spending to tame the country’s ballooning deficit, was outlined.

Brazil’s economic crisis is already corroding the significant gains made by Rousseff’s Worker’s Party. Under her predecessor’s watch – the popular Luiz Inacio “Lula” Da Silva – millions rose from extreme poverty. In 2014, Brazil was removed from the world hunger map.

A fall in commodities prices, the paralysing corruption scandal at state oil giant Petrobras and Rousseff’s unsuccessful macroeconomic policies saw Brazil’s economy shrank by 3.8 per cent last year, with similar predictions for 2016.

All three of the main ratings agencies have reduced Brazil to junk status. Millions have fallen back into poverty, with unemployment at 11 per cent and over a 1.5 million jobs lost in 2015.

Temer’s so called government of “national salvation” want to implement an austerity programme outlined in his party’s “Bridge to the Future” report, that advocates increased privatizations and public spending limits.

As well as cuts to health and education, Temer’s government hopes to scale back Brazil’s landmark social welfare programme “Bolsa Familia” by at least 10 per cent.

The programme awards poor families a small cash stipend for keeping kids vaccinated and in school. Far from perfect, the programme costs just 0.5 per cent of GDP and reaches 47million poor Brazilians. More cuts are expected to be announced in the coming months.

While such public spending cuts will hurt poor and lower income families, critics say they won’t make much impact on Brazil’s deficit, targeted at US$48 billion for 2016.

Brazil is not Venezuela. It remains the world’s 7th biggest economy with around US$360billion in foreign exchange reserves. Prices of commodities like iron ore and oil, which feed the economy, are on the rise again.

IMF Brazil director Otaviano Canuto pointed out in an interview with BBC Brasil that there is plenty of opportunity to increase taxes on the wealthy, something that no government, including the Worker’s Party, has ever approached. Brazil’s taxes on the rich are the lowest in the G20.

Tax avoidance in Brazil was recorded at more than US$117 billion in 2015, more than twice this year’s fiscal budget deficit target. Meanwhile, Brazilian company JBS, the world’s biggest meat company has moved its base to Ireland meaning it now doesn’t have to pay tax in Brazil. Temer’s finance minister Henrique Meirelles was a former chairman.

Resistance to the Temer government on the streets so far has been visible but lukewarm. Temer’s justice minister Alexandrae Moraes – whose Sao Paulo military police fired 48 stun grenades in 6 minutes at a bus fare hike protest earlier this year – promised to crack down on dissent upon taking office.

Social movement leaders say that they don’t recognise Temer’s government and promise to resist. In a small but symbolic victory, the ministry of culture was reinstalled following occupation, having been cancelled by Temer.

Many view Temer’s government as illegitimate. This sentiment may grow with further damaging audio leaks and sleaze allegations and if the economy doesn’t improve.

June 1, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Economics | , | Leave a comment

The Republic of Science

By Judith Curry | Climate Etc. | May 31, 2016

The professional standards of science must impose a framework of discipline and at the same time encourage rebellion against it. – Michael Polanyi (1962)

A recent tweet by Andrea Saltelli reminded me of Michael Polanyi’s 1962 essay “The Republic of Science: Its Political and Economic Theory.”

Polanyi provides an interesting perspective from the mid 20th century, as the U.S. and Europe were contemplating massive public investments in science. Polanyi’s perspective was colored by his early years in Hungary, which led him to oppose central planning in the sciences.

I encourage you to read Polanyi’s entire essay, it contains many interesting reflections on history and political philosophy of science. Below are some some excerpts with highlights that provide the springboard for my own reflections on the state of science (particularly climate science) in the early 21st century.

Excerpts:

MY title is intended to suggest that the community of scientists is organised in a way which resembles certain features of a body politic and works accor­ding to economic principles similar to those by which the production of material goods is regulated.

The first thing to make clear is that scientists, freely making their own choice of problems and pursuing them in the light of their own personal judgment are in fact cooperating as members of a closely knit organisation. [T]he principle of their coordination consists in the adjust­ment of the efforts of each to the hitherto achieved results of the others. We may call this a coordination by mutual adjustment of independent initiatives–of initiatives which are coordinated because each takes into account all the other initiatives operating within the same system.

Such self-coordination of independent initiatives leads to a joint result which is unpremeditated by any of those who bring it about. Their coordination is guided as by ‘an invisible band’ towards the joint discovery of a hidden system of things. Since its end-result is unknown, this kind of cooperation can only advance stepwise, and the total performance will be the best possible if each consecutive step is decided upon by the person most competent to do so. We may imagine this condition to be fulfilled for the fitting together of a jig-saw puzzle if each helper watches out for any new opportunities arising along a particular section of the hitherto completed patch of the puzzle, and also keeps an eye on a particular lot of pieces, so as to fit them in wherever a chance presents itself. The effectiveness of a group of helpers will then exceed that of any isolated member to the extent to which some member of the group will always discover a new chance for adding a piece to the puzzle more quickly than any one isolated person could have done by himself.

WHAT I have said here about the highest possible coordination of individual scientific efforts by a process of self-coordination may recall the self­ coordination achieved by producers and consumers operating in a market. It was, indeed, with this in mind that I spoke of ‘the invisible hand ‘ guiding the coordination of independent initiatives to a maximum advancement of science, just as Adam Smith invoked ‘ the invisible hand ‘ to describe the achievement of greatest joint material satisfaction when independent producers and consumers are guided by the prices of goods in a market.

In the case of science, adjustment takes place by taking note of the published results of other scientists; while in the case of the market, mutual adjustment is mediated by a system of prices broadcasting current exchange relations, which make supply meet demand.

[T]he decisions of a scientist choosing a problem and pursuing it to the exclusion of other possible avenues of inquiry may be said to have an economic character. For his decisions are designed to produce the highest possible result by the use of a limited stock of intellectual and material resources. The scientist fulfils this purpose by choosing a problem that is neither too hard nor too easy for him. The line the scientist must choose turns out, therefore, to be that of greatest ego­ involvement; it is the line of greatest excitement, sustaining the most intense attention and effort of thought. He should not hesitate to incur such a loss, if it leads him to deeper and more important problems.

BOTH the criteria of plausibility and of scientific value tend to enforce conformity, while the value attached to originality encourages dissent. This internal tension is essential in guiding and motivating scientific work. The professional standards of science must impose a framework of discipline and at the same time encourage rebellion against it. They must demand that, in order to be taken seriously, an investigation should largely conform to the currently predominant beliefs about the nature of things, while allowing that in order to be original it may to some extent go against these.

The authority of scientific standards is thus exercised for the very purpose of providing those guided by it with independent grounds for opposing it. The capacity to renew itself by evoking and assimilating opposition to itself appears to be logjcally inherent in the sources of the authority wielded by scientific orthodoxy.

But who is it, exactly, who exercises the authority of this orthodoxy? No single scientist has a sound understanding of more than a tiny fraction of the total domain of science. [W]hile scientists can admittedly exercise competent judgment only over a small part of science, they can usually judge an area adjoining their own special studies that is broad enough to include some fields on which other scientists have specialised. And, of course, each scientist who is a member of a group of overlapping competences will also be a member of other groups of the same kind, so that the whole of science will be covered by chains and net­works of overlapping neighbourhoods.

ADMITTEDLY, scientific authority is not distributed evenly throughout the body of scientists; some distinguished members of the profession dominate over others of a more junior standing. But the authority of scientific opinion remains essentially mutual; it is established between scientists, not above them.

Let me make it clear, even without going into detail, how great and varied are the powers exercised by this authority. Appointments to positions in universities and elsewhere, which offer opportunity for independent research, are filled in accordance with the appreciation of candidates by scientific opinion. Referees reporting on papers submitted to journals are charged with keeping out contributions which current scientific opinion condemns as unsound. Representatives of scientific opinion will pounce upon newspaper articles or other popular literature which would venture to spread views contrary to scientific opinion. The teaching of science in schools is controlled likewise. And, indeed, the whole outlook of man on the universe is conditioned by an implicit recognition· of the authority of scientific opinion.

Only by securing popular respect for its own authority can scientific opinion safeguard the complete inde­pendence of mature scientists and the unhindered publicity of their results, which jointly assure the spontaneous coordination of scientific efforts throughout the world.

DURING the last 20 to 30 years, there have been many suggestions and pressures towards guiding the progress of scientific inquiry in the direction of public welfare. I appreciate the generous sentiments which actuate the aspiration of guiding the progress of science into socially beneficent channels, but I hold its aim to be impossible and nonsensical.

I argued that the present  practice of filling vacant chairs by the most eminent candidate that the university can attract was the best safeguard for rational distribution of efforts over rival lines of scientific research. For the principal criterion for offering increased opportunities to a new subject was the rise of a growing number of distinguished scientists in that subject and the falling off of creative initiative in other subjects, indicating that resources should be withdrawn from them.

[L]ittle more can, or need, be done towards the advancement of science, than to assist spontaneous move­ments towards new fields of distinguished discovery, at the expense of fields that have become exhausted. Though special considerations may deviate from it, this procedure must be acknowledged as the major principle for maintaining a balanced development of scientific research.

Those who think that the public is interested in science only as a source of wealth and power are gravely misjudging the situation. Universities should have the courage to appeal to the electorate, and to the public in general, on their own genuine grounds. For the only justification for the pursuit of scientific research in universities lies in the fact that the universities provide an intimate communion for the for­mation of scientific opinion, free from corrupting intrusions and distractions. For though scientific discoveries eventually diffuse into all people’s thinking the general public cannot  participate in the intellectual milieu in which discoveries are made. Discovery comes only to a mind immersed in its pursuit. For such work the scientist needs a secluded place among like­ minded colleagues who keenly share his aims and sharply control his per­formances.

The more widely the republic of science extends over the globe, the more numerous become its members in each country and the greater the material resources at its command, the more clearly emerges the need for a strong and effective scientific authority to reign over this republic. When we reject today the interference of political religious authorities with the pursuit of science, we must do this in the name of the established scientific authority which safeguards the pursuit of science.

Consider, also, the fact that these scientific evaluations are exercised by a multitude of scientists, each of whom is competent to assess only a tiny fragment of current scientific work, so that no single person is responsible at first hand for the announcements made by science at any time. And remember that each scientist originally established himself as such by joining at some point a network of mutual appreciation extending far beyond his own horizon. Each such acceptance appears then as a submission to a vast range of value-judgments exercised over all the domains of science, which the newly accepted citizen of science henceforth endorses, although he knows hardly anything about their subject-matter. Thus, the standards of scientific merit are seen to be transmitted from generation to generation by the affiliation of individuals at a great variety of widely disparate points, in the same way as artistic, moral or legal traditions are transmitted. This conclusion gains important support from the fact that the methods of scientific inquiry cannot be explicitly formulated and hence can be transmitted only in the same way as an art, by the affiliation of apprentices to a master. The authority of science is essentially traditional.

But this tradition upholds an authority which cultivates originality. Scien­tific opinion imposes an immense range of authoritative pronouncements on the student of science, but at the same time it grants the highest encourage­ment to dissent from them in some particular. Scientific tradition enforces its teachings in general, for the very purpose of cultivating their subversion in the particular.

The Republic of Science shows us an association of independent initiatives, combined towards an indeterminate achievement. It is disciplined and motivated by serving a traditional authority, but this authority is dynamic; its continued existence depends on its constant self-renewal through the originality of its followers.

The Republic of Science is a Society of Explorers. Such a society strives towards an unknown future, which it believes to be accessible and worth achieving. In the case of scientists, the explorers strive towards a hidden reality, for the sake of intellectual satisfaction. And as they satisfy them­selves, they enlighten all men and are thus helping society to fulfil its obligation towards intellectual self-improvement.

Since a dynamic orthodoxy claims to be a guide in search of truth, it implicitly grants the right to opposition in the name of truth–truth being taken to comprise here, for brevity, all manner of excellence that we recognise as the ideal of self-improvement. Th[is] freedom assures them the right to speak the truth as they know it.

JC reflections

Polanyi’s essay provides some interesting insights, as well as some striking contrasts with the Republic of Science in the early 21st century.

Polanyi’s analogy of the scientific process with markets  captures the pure incentives that drive scientists – search of truth, intellectual satisfaction and individual ego. What happens when the externalities of the Republic of Science produce perverse incentives, and careerism becomes a dominant incentive that requires publishing a lot of papers rapidly and producing headline-worthy results (who even cares if these papers don’t survive scrutiny beyond their press release)? (see What is the measure of scientific success?) What happens is that you get increasing incidence of scientific fraud (see Science: in the doghouse?), cherry picking and meaningless papers on headline grabbing topics that don’t stand up to the test of time (see Trust and don’t bother to verify).

And what happens when the ‘hand’ guiding science isn’t ‘invisible’, i.e. science is driven by politics, such as a political imperative to move away from fossil fuels and towards renewable energy? Federal funding can bias science, particularly in terms of selecting which scientific problems receive attention (link).

And what of Polanyi’s statement: “Such self-coordination of independent initiatives leads to a joint result which is unpremeditated by any of those who bring it about.”  The ‘result’ of dangerous anthropogenic climate change and the harms of dietary fat were hardly unpremeditated.

When science is politically relevant and has been politicized, how objective are the authorities that are keepers of the orthodoxy — journal editors, officers of professional societies, university administrators — and how open are they to dissenting perspectives? The experiences of Lennart Bengtsson (link), my being called a ‘climate heretic’ (see my essay Heresy and the creation of monsters), Christopher Essex’s essay (link), Roger Pielke Jr’s experiences, and MANY more examples among climate scientists speak to the fact that the keepers of the climate science orthodoxy are failing in this regard [link to Are climate scientists being forced to toe the line?]. Without the internet and the blogosphere, these dissenting voices would be rendered silent by the keepers of the orthodoxy.

Climate and environmental sciences are far from the only scientific fields suffering in this way – the problem is also rampant in medicine, nutrition, and psychology [link to Partisanship and silencing science.]

Where lies the solution to this? Well, one possibility is reflected in Polanyi’s statement: “[L]ittle more can, or need, be done towards the advancement of science, than to assist spontaneous move­ments towards new fields of distinguished discovery, at the expense of fields that have become exhausted.” Now that climate science is ‘settled’, i.e. at least it is perceived to be sufficiently settled to provide the basis for a very expensive international climate ‘agreement’ (not treaty), perhaps future investments should be directed towards other fields that are deemed important or where greater progress can be made. This is exactly what has been happening in Australia, as the Turnbull administration has been axing climate jobs at CSIRO (link).

Is climate science ‘exhausted’ in terms of diminishing returns on future research? I would argue that climate science is an immature field with many unknowns; however the current paradigm of using inadequate climate models to focus on human caused climate change has reached the point of diminishing returns. Further, the intense politicization of the subject has adversely influenced the community of scientists — in terms of biasing the scientists and also in discouraging young scientists from entering and staying in the field. So in a sense, climate science has become ‘exhausted’ by the politicization.

Governments who fund science and universities who hire scientists need to make the hard decisions regarding which fields and subfields are most worthy of investment, in terms of new breakthrough science. While I was Chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, it was my privilege and opportunity to hire 27 faculty members (24 as primary appointments, 3 as joint hires) over the course of 13 years. This is a rare opportunity for a department in the geosciences. When I became Chair in 2002, the School had 4 divisions – geochemistry, geophysics, atmospheric chemistry, and atmospheric dynamics. I made it a priority to bring ‘water’ into the School, and to hire faculty members that could interact with other scientists and engineers, beyond the geosciences, to stimulate new research areas. Apart from these broad objectives, I hired the best people that we could attract, with little preference for specific research areas. This approach resulted in a reconfiguration of the school to include oceanography, planetary and space sciences, biogeochemistry, and new subfields of geophysics.

I did not hire much in the areas of atmospheric dynamics or climate science (outside of oceanography and biogeochemistry), simply because the quality of the applicants was not as strong as in the other fields. While I have inferred that my provost was not pleased that I did not hire more in ‘climate science’, the outstanding young scientists that I did hire are garnering substantial external recognition and are being heavily recruited by other universities (good luck to the new Chair in retaining these outstanding faculty members). Why didn’t I hire more in atmospheric dynamics and climate science? The atmospheric dynamics faculty candidates generally were in the areas of data assimilation and mesoscale modeling — areas that are important, but arguably engineering rather than science that is going to lead to a breakthrough in understanding. In climate science, most of the applicants were using climate models, by running scenarios and inferring dire consequences — not the climate dynamics theorists that I was hoping for, that could help understand and untangle the complex physical, chemical and even biological processes influencing the climate system.

In a broader sense, which scientific subfields and topics are deemed to be important and why? There is no easy answer to this, but it is the job of university Deans and federal funding agencies to prioritize. There is an interesting example currently in the news, that comes from Georgia Tech’s David Hu, Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering. He has written an essay Confessions of a Wasteful Scientist. Subtitle: Three of my projects appeared last week on a senator’s list of questionable research. Allow me to explain…

I would also like to respond to Polanyi’s statement: “universities provide an intimate communion for the for­mation of scientific opinion, free from corrupting intrusions and distractions.” I am very sad to report that this simply isn’t true of universities in the early 21st century. Heterodoxacademy.org is responding to the lack of intellectual diversity at universities. Universities are becoming very uncomfortable places for faculty members with minority perspectives on controversial topics.

As a result, many scientists with minority perspectives are leaving universities. Further, the internet has enabled many individuals outside of academia to make important contributions to climate science (published in refereed journals, in books, and in other reports). Polanyi wrote: “[T]he general public cannot participate in the intellectual milieu in which discoveries are made. For such work the scientist needs a secluded place among like­ minded colleagues who keenly share his aims and sharply control his per­formances.”  This is a perspective on scientists that is peculiar to the 20th century [see Scientist: the evolving story of a word]. Particularly in climate science, we are seeing the emergence of a substantial and influential cohort of non-academic scientists, contributing both to the published literature and the public scientific debate. This broadening of the notions of expertise away from university elites is leading some to question whether our traditional notions of expertise are dead [link].

So, what should the Republic of Science look like in the 21st century? The overwhelming issue for the health of science is to reassert the importance of intellectual and political diversity in science, and to respect and even nurture scientific mavericks. The tension between pure (curiosity driven) science and use-inspired and applied science [see Pasteur’s quadrant] needs to be resolved in a way that supports all three, with appropriate roles for universities, government and the private sector. And finally, the reward structure for university scientists need to change to reward more meaningful science that stands the test of time, versus counting papers and press releases, which may not survive even superficial scrutiny even after being published in prestigious journals that are more interested in impact than in rigorous methods and appropriate conclusions.

Failure to give serious thought to these issues risks losing the public trust and support for elite university science (at least in certain fields). Scientists are becoming their own worst enemy when they play into the hands of politicians and others seeking to politicize their science.

May 31, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

The New State Department Report on Hillary’s Email, and Why it Matters

By Peter Van Buren | We Meant Well | May 27, 2016

The State Department Inspector General’s (IG) investigation report leaked out a day early on May 25 makes a number of significant points. These matter, and need to be considered by anyone voting in November.

What’s in the IG Report

— Neither Clinton nor any of her senior staff would participate in the IG’s investigation.

— Clinton never sought approval, legal or technical, for her unprecedented private email system.

— IT staffers and others at State warned her against it.

— Had she sought approval, the State Department would not have granted it.

— Clinton violated Federal Records laws.

— Clinton did not turn over all of her work-related emails. Several (unclassified) were quoted in the IG report that had never been released.

— Clinton violated State Department policies and guidelines in place at the time, even as the State Department enforced those on the rank-and-file.

— IT staff at the State Department who raised concerns internally were falsely told the server was approved and ordered to not discuss it further.

— Clinton’s use of a non-standard email account caused many of her emails to not reach their recipients inside State, and ended up instead in Spam.

— State Department staffers not in Clinton’s inner circle aware of her private email address could not communicate with the head of their agency.

— His State Department bosses did not know their employee, Bryan Pagliano, was simultaneously working directly for Clinton maintaining her private server.

— The server came under severe enough hacker attacks that its administrator had to physically unplug it to prevent intrusions.

The question of classified material handling is, by agreement, being left by State to the FBI, and is thus not addressed in the IG report.

All of that is in the report. I’ve read the whole thing, and if you do not believe my summary, above, or wonder what specific laws and regulations are being cited, you can also read the whole thing and learn for yourself.

What Matters

— For the first time, a set of actual facts of Clinton’s actions and decisions have been laid out by an independent, government entity. The IG was appointed by Obama and his report is dispassionate. No one can realistically claim this is a hit job. Sources are cited and laws footnoted.

— Clinton did break Federal Records laws and violate State Department regulations that her organization held others to.

— Despite repeated promises of transparency and cooperation, neither Hillary nor any of her senior staff would agree to participate in the IG’s investigation. Former Sectaries of State Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell and Madeleine Albright did participate fully and voluntarily in the investigation. Clinton alone did not.

— Clinton never sought approval, and ignored advice to stop what she was doing. She ran the server with no oversight. With no oversight, the only check on Clinton was Clinton herself.

— That lack of oversights extended to potential destruction of evidence. It was Clinton alone who determined which emails to turn over to the State Department as “work related” and which to delete, some 30,000. It was Clinton who made the decision to then try and wipe the server clean. It is unclear whether or not the FBI can forensically retrieve and review those 30,000 deleted emails.

Simply put, what she did wasn’t supposed to be done.

Why It Matters

— Hillary Clinton lied when she claimed her actions were approved. She lied when she said there were no regulations in place at the time of her server decisions. She lied when she said she broke no laws. She lied when she said this all was a Republican hit job. She lied when she said she would cooperate with any investigation.

— Hillary Clinton covered up her actions for four years as Secretary, then another two years after she left office, and only admitted to anything after it hit the news last year.

— Hillary Clinton asks voters to trust her with the most important job in America. She has not shown she is trustworthy.

— Hillary Clinton asks to be America’s leader. She did not lead her State Department, and she showed contempt for its rules. She did not lead by example.

— Hillary Clinton made clear by her actions that she believes rules that apply to others do not apply to her.

— Hillary Clinton by her actions succeeded in hiding all of her official emails from the Freedom of Information Act for six years in open contempt for that process and the American people.

— Hillary Clinton purposefully and willfully created a system that exempted her from the oversight applied to every other government employee.

— Hillary Clinton alone in the entire U.S. government conducted 100% of her official business on a private email server.

Defense?

The other shoe has yet to drop. Though the Inspectors General from the intelligence community have stated unequivocally that Clinton did handle highly classified material on her unsecured server, the FBI report on the same matter has not yet been released.

For those who wish to defend Clinton with the “but everybody did it” argument, Condoleezza Rice did not send any emails on any unsecured system at all. Powell and Albright sent a handful in the early days of the web. All of them cooperated in the State IG investigation. None of them ran a fully private system for four years and most importantly, none of them are asking us to trust them now running for president.

If your support is whittle down to a sad Hillary is down to “well, she’s not Trump,” do be careful what you wish for. She’s not Trump, but she is all of the above.

For those who wish to defend Clinton by saying “she’s not indicted,” well, actual criminality is a pretty low bar to set for the most important job in America. Also, the FBI has yet to release its report which may point to actual national security violations.

And lastly, it is not about crime per se, but about trust and judgement.

BONUS: If Bernie Sanders will not discuss any of this publically, he does not want to be president.

May 29, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

New Survey: Over Two-Thirds of California Voters Oppose Asset Forfeiture

By TJ Martinell | The Tenth Amendment Center | May 27, 2016

One thing Californians agree on is their opposition to laws that allow law enforcement to seize and keep people’s cash and property merely for being suspects of a crime, also known as asset forfeiture (learn more here).

That’s according to a two new surveys by the Public Policy Polling. The surveys found “overwhelming statewide and local opposition” to asset forfeiture laws. Over two-thirds of voters surveyed (82 percent) opposed these laws compared to 14 percent in favor of them.

Opposition to asset forfeiture also transcended party lines. Rough the same amount of Democrats, Republicans and independents expressed aversion to the idea that our property rights don’t apply when someone is suspected of crime – even if they’re never convicted.

Their support is not due to voter ignorance, as PPP also found that “opposition to civil asset forfeiture laws strengthens as voters learn more about them” and very few changed their minds after hearing law enforcement arguments justifying these laws. Maybe that’s because 17 percent of those surveyed knew someone who had lost property to police without a conviction.

Although California has asset forfeiture restrictions a loophole allows local police to pass off cases to the federal government, while still getting up to 80 percent of the proceeds obtained through civil forfeiture.

A bill introduced last year in the California state Senate would rein in these practices by law enforcement agencies. After passing the Senate by a wide margin, SB 443 was hit by massive opposition and delays in the Assembly. It was pulled from the “inactive file” this week and a final Assembly vote is expected in coming days.

California residents should contact their Assemblymember and insist the loophole be closed once and for all.

There’s also a Facebook group to support SB443 – HERE.

May 29, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption | , | Leave a comment

Argentine President Macri Wants Amnesty for Tax Dodgers, Like Himself

teleSUR | May 28, 2016

President Mauricio Macri will propose an amnesty law for those who bring back to Argentina any undeclared funds that were kept in overseas accounts, in order to settle debts with state pensioners.

“Argentines have billions of pesos overseas because they didn’t trust in the state. We need to tell them to join us, to be part of our new era. We invite them to wipe the fiscal slate clean,” said Macri.

President Macri said he will present the bill to Congress with three options. First, people can pay a tax of 5 percent for up to US$56,000 and 10 percent above that until Jan. 1, 2017. Second, they can convert their funds to bonds in the country. The last option, they can place the money in long-term investment in Argentina.

“Last time we had this process, which was easier, the country collected only $670 million dollars. Therefore, this law has nothing to do with the economy, but that there is dirty money associated with top officials in the government that needs to be cleaned,” said lawmaker Claudio Lozano.

Macri admitted this week that he has US$18 million in tax havens after he repeatedly denied earlier allegations arising from being named in the Panama Papers. He also failed to declare his high-level positions in two offshore companies in Panama in his mandatory declaration at the beginning of his term.

Macri’s fortune went from USD$52 million in December 2015 to USD$110 million in May 2016.

On the other hand, austerity and neoliberal policies rolled out since Macri took power continue to hit the country, such as price hikes in public services, transportation, gas and electricity. The country also holds its highest inflation rate since 2002.

RELATED:

Macri Backs Tax Breaks for the Rich, Layoffs for the Poor

Panama Papers: Macri Implicated in Offshore Tax Haven Scandal

May 29, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Economics | , | Leave a comment

Britain’s Secret Drug-Running Operations in Colombia

By T.J. Coles | Axis of Logic | May 25, 2016

Since the 1980s, when Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS) and Special Boat Service started operating in Colombia, special forces on all sides have been killing rival drug gangs and even counter-narcotics police units. This amounts to a proxy drug-smuggling network, which Britain has aided for decades.

Cocaine is a huge industry, worth some $60 billion per annum. Coke is mainly a middle-class drug, used by politicians, models, film stars, and people in music, media, and other industries. More importantly, coke and other drug monies are untraceable and can be used for military black ops. A great deal is known about the US Central Intelligence Agency’s s role in drug running. Alfred McCoy’s The Politics of Heroin , Gary Webb’s Dark Alliance, and Douglas Valentine’s The Strength of the Wolf are vital exposés. Much less is known about MI6’s role.

NETWORKS UNDER THATCHER

According to Grace Livingstone, throughout the 1980s, drug barons, paramilitaries, and members of the Colombia government began a heavy drug-money laundering campaign via land purchases, acquiring 10% of the country.

The connections between drugs and politics are such that the Medellin and Cali cocaine cartels funded President Ernesto Samper’s 1998 election campaign. Pablo Escobar’s Medellin cartel attempted to get farmers to cultivate coca, which, initially, the FARC opposed. FARC is the Marxist-turned-terrorist resistance group which calls for more equal land reform. According to Livingstone, Escobar’s money laundering greatly aided the poor (undercutting FARC’s campaign advantage) to the extent that churches praised his urban regeneration initiatives.

Initially, Britain backed Escobar, until, it would seem, his poverty relief efforts got out of hand and ended up undermining big business. The Ford-sponsored Women’s Commission commented on the “narcotrade-financed paramilitary forces,” adding that they “often [work] with the support or acquiescence of [UK trained- and armed] Colombian police and military forces.”

The standard propaganda is that SAS assassins were sent by Prime Minister Thatcher in 1989 at the behest of President Barco, “to fight the drug cartels.” In the real world, they were sent to fight the FARC cartels. By 1985, the wealthy Asociación Campesina de Agricultores y Ganaderos del Magdalena Medio (ACDEGAM) “had powerful new members: drug traffickers who bought land in the Middle Magdalena,” Human Rights Watch reported, adding that, “In 1987 and 1988, the [ACDEGAM] even sponsored training centers with foreign instructors from Israel and Great Britain.”

A 1990 inquiry led by Louis Blom-Cooper QC revealed that “British mercenaries had been training the [Medellin] cartel’s death squads,” and that successive British governments “turned a blind eye to the sale of weapons to the Medellin cartel.” The Financial Times reported that in 1988, ex-SAS mercenaries worked with the former Israeli Colonel Yair Gal Klein’s Spearhead company to arm and train the Medellin cartel, and, again, “the British government ha[d] turned a blind eye.”

Mercenary firms cannot operate without the approval of the Foreign Office.

NETWORKS UNDER BLAIR

Britain’s active support for the drugs trade continues.

“In May 2006 troops of a High Mountain Battalion (whose members receive UK military assistance) were ordered by their commanding officer to ambush and kill ten counter-narcotics police officers near the town of Jamundi in the region of Valle del Cauca,” according to a detailed account by the Justice for Colombia group. “Small teams of SAS specialists rotate routinely through Bogota, and work with General Serrano’s main unit, La Jungla,” reports David Smith. The Independent notes that “Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galán, a fierce opponent of the drug trade, was assassinated, some Colombian government sources say, by British mercenaries.”

Former SAS mercenary David Tomkins was “due to appear before US District Judge Adalberto Jordan” for his alleged role in the attempted murder of Escobar, whom, as noted, appeared to have fallen out of favour with Britain and America after diverting coke money to the poor. “US officials [say Tomkins] will avoid trial and have time off his sentence,” indicating that he is still a secret ally. Tomkins “planned an attack on the drug lord’s stronghold at the Hacienda Napoles, east of Medellin,” the paper reported, but the “helicopter flew into a mountainside, killing the pilot. Tomkins and his associate Peter McAleese, a former SAS officer, were forced to walk three days to safety through the Colombian jungle.”

More recently, the International Crisis Group noted that Colombian police “seized [a] USB memory stick of a key alleged associate of Daniel Barrera (alias “Loco Barrera”), a drug lord …, that reportedly contained a detailed monthly payroll of over $1.5 million for 890 politicians, military and justice officers and informants,” indicating the levels of politico-drug interconnections throughout the country. In 2003, the late Pedro Juan Moreno, Chief of Staff in Antioquia, was accused of drug-running by US Customs, which seized shipments of potassium permanganate.

The London Progressive Journal writes: “[that] the British government is unconcerned as to who it is working with was [demonstrated] in December 2007,” when then-Foreign Office Minister Kim Howells “was photographed with soldiers of the High Mountain Battalions.” The paper adds that “Howells also posed for the camera alongside General Mario Montoya; a man [who] has a 30 year history of involvement with right wing paramilitaries, death squads and drug traffickers.”

NETWORKS UNDER CAMERON

Colombia’s coke is mainly channelled to Europe via the Caribbean, and to the US through Mexico. In July 2012, a US Congress report into HSBC’s involvement in drug laundering found that “the Mexican affiliate of HSBC transported $7 billion in physical US dollars to HSBUS from 2007 to 2008, outstripping other Mexican banks, even one twice its size, raising red flags that the volume of dollars included proceeds from illegal drug sales in US.” Forbes reports that “HSBC actively circumvented rules designed to “block transactions involving terrorists, drug lords, and rogue regimes”—the latter referring to Iran and Syria.

The Daily Mail reports: “Concerns over the bank’s links to Mexican drug dealers included £1.3 billion stashed in accounts in the Cayman Islands. One HSBC compliance officer admitted the accounts were misused by ‘organised crime’.” The Daily Mail also notes that David Cameron’s Trade Minister, Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint, “chaired HSBC during the period covered by the allegations.” Labour MP John Mann said of Lord Green: “Someone whose bank has been assisting murdering drug cartels and corrupt regimes across the world should not be in charge of a government portfolio.”

This article is taken from Britain’s Secret Wars (Clairview Books, 2016). The author, T.J. Coles, is director of the Plymouth Institute for Peace Research (www.pipr.co.uk).

May 29, 2016 Posted by | Book Review, Corruption, Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Clinton ignores question of how much money Goldman Sachs CEO gave her son-in-law’s hedge fund

RT | May 28, 2016

Hillary Clinton refused to disclose how much money Goldman Sachs’ chief executive invested in her son-in-law’s fund, ignoring questions from The Intercept during a photo-op fundraising event in San Francisco.

The publication’s reporter, Lee Fang, visited Clinton’s campaign rally in San Francisco on Thursday, as she kept busy touring California to raise last minute support ahead of the crucial June 7 primary.

As the former secretary of state was doing photo ops, Fang jumped in with his question.

“Do you know how much money [Goldman Sachs chief executive] Lloyd Blankfein invested in your son-in-law’s hedge fund?”

In fact, he peppered her with the question, but Clinton chose not to pay any attention at all, staying focused on picture-taking with her supporters.

Moments later, Clinton’s campaign traveling press secretary Nick Merrill stepped in, but he was unable, or unwilling, to help when asked the same question.

“I don’t know, has it been reported?” Merrill responded, before promising to “email it right now” once Fang handed off his contact information.

Merrill has yet to follow up, according to Fang.

Eaglevale Partners LP, founded by Marc Mezvinsky, husband of Hillary’s daughter Chelsea Clinton, and his two partners, has been supported with investments from several wealthy names of Wall Street, including Goldman Sachs chief executive Blankfein.

The CEO also allowed the use of his name in the marketing of Mezvinsky’s flagship fund, which is currently managing about $330 million.

However, despite having Blankfein by his side, Mezvinsky and his fund suffered losses linked to an ill-timed bet on Greece’s economic recovery. It was reportedly the Clinton’s son-in-law, who recommended his investors to put their money behind Greek government bonds, betting that the Greek economy would improve.

In February 2015, the Wall Street Journal broke the news that Eaglevale admitted in a letter to its investors that it was “incorrect” on Greece. According to the newspaper, the dedicated Greek fund also included an investment from Marc Lasry, a longtime Clinton donor, who formerly employed Chelsea Clinton at his $13.3 billion New York hedge-fund firm, Avenue Capital Group.

After losing 90 percent of its value, Mezvinsky was forced to close the Greece-focused fund called Eaglevale Hellenic Opportunity earlier this year. According to The New York Times, the fund raised $25 million from investors in order to buy Greek bank stocks and government debt.

Goldman Sachs is known to have cozy financial relations with the Clintons, including the company’s paying $675,000 in personal speaking fees to Hillary Clinton as well as $1,550,000 to Bill Clinton for the same service. Donations between $250,000 and $500,000 were also made to the Clinton Foundation, The Intercept reported.

The publication has been trying to find out whether Hillary Clinton is going to release the transcripts of her paid speeches to Goldman Sachs. Fang is reported to have been the first to pose that question in January, but four months later, the likely Democratic nominee for president only laughed and turned away.

Throughout her campaign, Clinton has been repeatedly called upon to disclose her relationships with Wall Street banks, but she has so far avoided giving direct answers.

READ MORE:

Hillary Clinton’s wealthy donors revealed in Panama Papers

May 28, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , , , , | Leave a comment

Poroshenko appoints former NATO chief Rasmussen ‘non-staff adviser’

RT | May 28, 2016

A former NATO Secretary General has been chosen as a new “non-staff” adviser to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, according to a decree bearing his signature. However, the document implies that the ex-chief is yet to agree to the appointment.

“Appoint Anders Fogh Rasmussen as adviser to the President of Ukraine outside the official staff (subject to his consent),” says the decree also published on the Ukrainian president’s official website.

Rasmussen was the twelfth Secretary General of NATO in the period from August 2009 to September 2014. He was also Danish Prime Minister from 2001 to 2009. In 2014, Poroshenko awarded Rasmussen, who still was NATO Secretary General at that time, with the Order of Freedom – the highest Ukrainian award for foreign citizens – for his “significant personal contribution to the development of cooperation between Ukraine and NATO as well as for considerable support for Ukraine’s sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity.”

Rasmussen is yet to comment and either confirm or deny his appointment. Last year, US Senator John McCain, also appointed by Kiev to a similar position, eventually turned down the proposal claiming that the US constitution prohibited him from getting on board.

The assignment of the role to Rasmussen comes soon after Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council adopted a program for the reorganization of Ukraine’s defense industry as well as military in line with NATO standards on May 20.

“We are beginning real reorganization of the defense and security sector in order to join NATO,” Poroshenko said at the time, commenting on this decision. He stressed that Ukraine had not been directly making steps for immediate accession to the Alliance but called the move “The Rubicon” that Ukrainian armed forces and the defense industry would have to “pass” to adapt to NATO standards, as reported by TASS.

The deputy head of the Russian parliament’s defense committee, Sergey Zhigarev, called Rasmussen’s appointment to the position of the presidential adviser a sign of the Ukrainian president’s mistrust of his own people.

“This is a very bad sign. It shows that he [Poroshenko] does not trust his own citizens that entrusted him with leading their country,” Zhigarev told Sputnik.

In the meantime, Rasmussen is not the first foreign citizen in Ukraine’s Presidential Administration as some foreigners even held ministerial posts in the Ukrainian government. In 2014, Poroshenko appointed Natalie Ann Jaresko, an American-born Ukrainian investment banker, as Ukraine’s Minister of Finance, while former Georgian Health Minister Alexander Kvitashvili took the post of the head of the Ukrainian Health ministry and Aivaras Abromavicius, a Lithuanian businessman, became Ukraine’s Minister of Economy and Trade. They held their posts till the new government was installed in April 2016.

Leszek Balcerowicz, Poland’s former deputy prime minister, now serves as Poroshenko’s representative in the Ukrainian government while former Slovakian Finance Minister Ivan Miklos is now the head of a group of Ukrainian prime minister’s advisers.

Meanwhile, former Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, wanted for trial on corruption charges at home, was granted Ukrainian citizenship so that he could take the post of the Ukrainian Odessa region.

Saakashvili was appointed as governor of Ukraine’s Odessa Region in May of 2015, after which he brought in several members of his old Georgian team, including Ukraine’s current national police chief Khatia Dekanoidze, who was Georgia’s education minister; Deputy Interior Minister Eka Zguladze, who held a similar position in the Georgian government; Deputy General Prosecutor David Sakvarelidze, who held a similar position in the Georgian government as well, and was also Saakashvili’s lawyer; and Gizo Uglava, Ukraine’s current Head of the Anticorruption Bureau and Georgia’s former deputy general prosecutor.

May 28, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

New Brazil cabinet in trouble after leaks on anti-Rousseff plot

Press TV – May 24, 2016

Brazil’s interim government has been rattled by a leaked audio tape suggesting a plot against suspended President Dilma Rousseff, a scandal that forced a key minister in the new cabinet to resign.

Brazilian Planning Minister Romero Juca, a close ally of acting President Michel Temer, said Monday he is stepping down.

The decision came a day after a Brazilian newspaper published the transcript of a secretly-taped conversation between him and Sérgio Machado, a former senator.

Juca was caught on the tape saying Rousseff needed to be removed in an attempt to quash a vast corruption investigation that implicated him and other politicians, in what analysts call a first major political blow to the acting administration.

“We have to change the government to be able to stop this bleeding,” he was reportedly recorded saying.

Juca admitted earlier in the day that one of the two voices heard on the tape was his, but said his comments have been misinterpreted and taken out of context.

Later in the conversation, Juca says he talked about his plans to Supreme Sourt justices, who told him the corruption investigation and its media coverage would never come to an end as long as Rousseff remained in power.

The tape was recorded just weeks before the lower house of parliament voted to impeach Rousseff, according to the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper, which published chunks of a 75-minute conversation on Monday.

The impeachment bid was launched over allegations that the president manipulated government accounts before the last election. Rousseff, however, has denied the allegations.

Earlier this month, Brazil’s upper chamber of the National Congress voted to suspend Rousseff and begin an impeachment trial against her. Acting President Michel Temer stepped up from the post of vice-president and replaced her.

Reacting to the leaks, Rousseff said the tape proves that she has been a victim of a “political coup d’état.”

“This only confirms what we have been talking about for some time: it confirms the coup against Dilma,” said Paulo Rocha, the Senate leader for the Workers’ Party of Rousseff.

Ever since her suspension, the Latin American country has been the scene of nationwide demonstrations.

On Friday protesters took to the streets of Sao Paulo, calling for the resignation of Temer. They held banners and chanted slogans to support Rousseff.

May 24, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , , | Leave a comment

Saudi offers to change stance on Israel: Report

Press TV – May 22, 2016

Saudi Arabia and its allies have asked Israel to resume Middle East negotiations under new terms which include changes to Riyadh’s “peace” initiative, Israeli media reports say.

The kingdom, its Persian Gulf allies, Jordan and Egypt have been sending messages to Israel through various emissaries, including former British PM Tony Blair, the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva reported.

“They are expecting to receive from Israel a response and are also expecting Israel to make gestures toward the Palestinians” in the West Bank, the paper said.

The Saudi “peace” initiative, unveiled in 2002, offers to normalize ties with Israel by 22 Arab countries in return for Tel Aviv’s withdrawal from the occupied West Bank.

Tel Aviv has rejected the Saudi initiative due to the fact that it calls for Israel to accept the right of return for the Palestinians who were forced to flee their homes under the Israeli occupation.

Saudi Arabia and its allies are now prepared to discuss changes to the initiative in order to resume talks between Tel Aviv and the Palestinian Authority, Israels’ Channel 10 News revealed.

The daily Maariv revealed earlier this month that the Israeli regime would present a bill to the Knesset in the coming weeks, calling for the annexation of 60% of the West Bank.

According to the paper, preliminary talks have been held to annex Area C of the West Bank where more than 350,000 illegal Israeli settlers are based.

Nevertheless, there is a desire among the leadership of the Arab countries in the region to change their attitude towards Israel and to start taking an active mediating role, Channel 10 reported, citing diplomatic sources.

The report comes days after Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi urged Israelis and Palestinians to seize what he said was a “real opportunity” and renew “peace” talks.

Most extremist cabinet in the works

PM Benjamin Netanyahu, however, is set to form the most extremist cabinet in Israel’s history after revealing his intention to name notorious politician Avigdor Lieberman as the new minister of military affairs.

Palestinians have denounced the planned appointment, saying the decision showed Israel was intent on spreading extremism and expanding illegal settlements.

As the minister of military affairs, Lieberman would oversee military operations in the Palestinian territories and have a major say in policy towards the settlements.

Lieberman himself lives in a settlement which the international community considers illegal and persistent expansion of settler units as one of the biggest causes of the escalating tensions.

He has called on the Israeli regime to treat Palestinian resistance movement Hamas the same way as the United States treated “the Japanese in World War II.”

Israeli-Saudi links

On Saturday, an Israeli website said the “nightmare” of those critical of the new Israeli cabinet “is if Saudi King Salman and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, along with Netanyahu and Lieberman, will sit on the same podium and sign a cooperation agreement.”

“But this is a reality that is happening every day, not just wishful thinking,” the Israeli military intelligence website Debkafile wrote.

Last month, a well-connected former general in the Saudi military said the kingdom would open an embassy in Tel Aviv if Israel accepted the Saudi initiative to end the Middle East conflict.

Anwar Eshki was asked during an Al Jazeera interview how long it would be before Riyadh opened an embassy in Israel.

“You can ask Mr. Netanyahu,” Eshki replied, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Jerusalem Post reported on its website.

“If he announces that he accepts the initiative and gives all rights to Palestinians, Saudi Arabia will start to make an embassy in Tel Aviv,” Eshki said.

Eshki met publicly in June with Dore Gold just before the latter was appointed director-general of the Israeli foreign ministry. Gold said then Israel had contacts with “almost every Arab state.”

In the interview, Eshki said the Saudis are not interested in “Israel becoming isolated in the region.”

In March, Netanyahu said Israel’s relations with regional Arab countries were “dramatically warming” in what analysts said was an acknowledgement of behind-the-scenes ties.

Moshe Ya’alon, Israel’s minister of military affairs who resigned on Friday, pointed to open channels between the regime and Arab states in February.

Ya’alon said he was unable to shake hands with Arab officials in public due to the “sensitive” political realities, however, the two sides  “can meet in closed rooms.”

The Israeli minister later publicly shook the hand of Saudi Prince Turki bin Faisal al-Saud, who himself has openly met with a number of Israeli officials in the past.

Israeli training Saudi forces: Hezbollah 

Sheikh Naim Qassem, deputy secretary general of Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement, said in April that Israel was training Saudi military forces under the framework of clandestine relations.

Dozens of Saudi military officers were being trained following secret contacts that led to military cooperation, he said.

“The Saudis are currently fulfilling the cycle of the Israeli project in public and secret meetings,” he added.

May 22, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , | Leave a comment

How US Creates Safety Risks for Nuclear Power Plants in Europe

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© Wikipedia/ Maxim Gavrilyuk
Sputnik – 21.05.2016

Washington is promoting commercial interests of the energy corporation Westinghouse in Europe, creating risks for European nuclear power plants, an article in Forbes read.

For example, in 2015, two of the Westinghouse-made fuel assemblies at the South Ukraine nuclear power plant (NPP) were found to be leaking. Since 2015, the NPP has been using US-made fuel.

In 2014, Ukraine and Westinghouse reached an agreement to supply nuclear fuel to some Ukrainian NPPs. The alleged reason behind the contract was the need to help Ukraine become energetically independent from Russia. Russia was a long-time supplier of nuclear fuel to Ukraine.

Experts have repeatedly warned that the deal would create serious risks for the safety of Ukrainian NPPs.

They cited the example of an incident which took place several years ago at the Temelin nuclear power plant, in the Czech Republic. The NPP operated on Russian-designed reactors and used fuel supplied by Westinghouse. The fuel was leaking and the rods were bending. All the Westinghouse fuel was removed from the core and replaced with Russian-made fuel.

As for Ukraine, the company announced that its fuel for Ukrainian NPPs had been improved.

Despite experts’ warnings, in March 2015, the first 42 fuel assemblies made by Westinghouse were loaded to the third reactor unit at the South Ukraine NPP.

According to Forbes, the two Westinghouse-made assemblies were found leaking during a scheduled outage at the third unit of the NPP.

The author of the article, Forbes contributor Kenneth Rapoza described how Washington has promoted Westinghouse’s interest in Eastern Europe, neglecting safety recommendations.

“Westinghouse is more than a brand name American power company. It’s a battering ram used by Washington to promote energy security,” the author wrote.

A source who wished to remain anonymous told Forbes that Westinghouse wants a market share in Eastern Europe in a bid to prevent the company from insolvency.

“Their new reactor division is loss-making, the fuel division is their only cash cow and it is not growing and existing margins are getting slimmer and slimmer. We think Westinghouse has spent millions of dollars to include nuclear fuel as part of the energy security narrative, and the current EU sentiment against Russia play into their hand,” the source said.

“But derailing nuclear projects while running into technical difficulties with Westinghouse fuel assemblies in Rosatom reactors is a dangerous way to promote energy security,” Rapoza noted.

According to former Czech Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek, the US has been promoting Westinghouse for years.

In the 1990s, US diplomats supported contribution between the Czech Republic and Westinghouse. The company pledged to improve Russian-designed nuclear plants to Western standards.

“However, the opposite proved to be true. Fuel assemblies delivered by Westinghouse were of inferior quality and higher price compared with than Russian fuel and caused frequent outages of Temelin reactors,” Paroubek told Forbes.

After, Westinghouse’s fuel assemblies were found leaking in the 2000s the Czech company CEZ decided to return to Russian-made nuclear fuel for the Temelin NPP.

“CEZ’s decision serves as a testament to the fact that the Russian fuel assembly was safer and that Washington was selling a product that did not quite work at the time, potentially putting nuclear power plants in danger,” the article read.

US presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton was also involved in promoting Westinghouse in Eastern Europe. In 2012 when she served as US State Secretary Clinton met with then Czech Prime Minister Petr Necas, using the energy security argument to promote the company.

According to the article, Westinghouse can produce fuel for Russia-designed reactors as well as Rosatom can build fuel assemblies for Western-designed power units. However, for third parties working with Westinghouse is less economically efficient.

“Russia is the cheaper producer of the two, so when countries turn to Westinghouse for the fuel assemblies, they have to pay a premium for diversification,” Rapoza wrote.

Nevertheless, the largest initiative by Westinghouse is squeezing Russia from the Ukrainian nuclear fuel market, using again the argument of diversifying supplies.

In 2012, the Ukrainian nuclear regulator banned the use of Westinghouse’s fuel assemblies in the country pending an investigation over the incident at the South Ukraine NPP.

“Two years later, then-Prime Minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk consulted Westinghouse on picking a new nuclear safety regulator for his new government,” the author wrote citing a source in Ukraine.

In April, the Ukrainian Energy Ministry announced it would buy more nuclear fuel from Westinghouse. The company is planning to deliver five reloads of fuel to South Ukraine and Zaporizhia NPPs.

According to the author, Westinghouse’s commercial interests are closely tied to politics and thus the company neglects safety.

“Regardless, anti-Russia politics trumps technological problems,” Rapoza concluded.

May 21, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Economics, Environmentalism, Nuclear Power | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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