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The Deep State Breaks Surface

By Craig Murray | March 22, 2018

I confess I found it difficult to get worked up about the Cambridge Analytica affair. My reactions was “What awful people. But surely everybody realises that is what Facebook does?”. It seemed to me hardly news, on top of which the most likely outcome is that it will be used as yet another excuse to introduce government controls on the internet and clamp down on dissenting views like those on this website, where 85% of all traffic comes through Facebook or Twitter.

But two nights ago my interest was piqued when, at the height of Cambridge Analytica’s domination of the news cycle, the BBC gave it considerably less airtime than the alcohol abuse problems of someone named Ant. The evening before, the BBC had on Newsnight given the CEO of Cambridge Analytica the most softball interview imaginable. If the BBC is obviously downplaying something, it is usually defending a deep British Establishment interest.

It took me a minute to find out that Cambridge Analytica is owned by a British company, SCL Ltd, which in effect does exactly the same activities in the UK that Cambridge Analytica was undertaking in the US. I then looked up SCL on Bloomberg.

The name which jumped out at me of course was Lord Ivar Mountbatten, direct descendant of Queen Victoria and scion of the family closest friends with that of the UK’s unelected monarch. The only person listed by Companies House as having “significant control” – ie over 25% of the shares – is Roger Gabb, the wine merchant known for large donations to the Tory Party. I have now spoken to people who know him fairly well who, I must note in fairness, universally say he is a kind and very bright man, but with no technical input in the kind of work performed by SCL/Cambridge Analytica.

SCL is as Establishment as a company can get. The most worrying aspect of this is that SCL is paid by the British government to manipulate public opinion particularly in the fields of “Security” and “Defence”, and still more worryingly SCL – this group of ultra Tory money men seeking to refine government propaganda at the expense of you, the taxpayer – is cleared by the MOD to access classified government information.

I then did a news search on google for “Mountbatten” and “SCL” and it brought up zero results from corporate and state media. I then did a wider search not just of news sites, and found this excellent article from Liam O’Hare on Bella Caledonia. It said everything I had been planning to write, and probably says it better. Please do read it. Liam has actually done this to me before, getting there first. I suspect we may be the same person. Come to think of it, I have never seen a photo of us together.

PS Everyone of my generation will remember this joke. “What’s white and flies across the sea at 300mph?” We had a more robust attitude to free speech in the 70’s, and the maudlin deference to the “Royal family” had much less hold on the population.

March 22, 2018 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , | Leave a comment

‘Israel is Lying, What They Bombed in 2007 Wasn’t a Nuclear Facility’ – Analyst

Sputnik – March 22, 2018

Israel’s Defense Forces stated that four Israeli jets destroyed a nuclear facility in the Syrian province of Deir ez-Zor in 2007. Sputnik discussed the reasons why this announcement has been made now with Dr. Taleb Ibrahim, a Syrian political analyst and deputy director of the Damascus Centre for Strategic Studies.

Sputnik: Why has this information been disclosed only now, after eleven years?

Dr. Taleb Ibrahim: I think that Israel, the Israelis are lying because what they bombed in 2007 was not a nuclear facility because it is very well known that Syria doesn’t have such kinds of facilities and actually there isn’t any nuclear program in Syria. They targeted a certain military base in Syria under the pretext of attacking a nuclear facility, so because of that at the present time they are revealing that to send a signal to Iran that they are ready to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities and the Israeli air force is able to reach any place in the region; I think this is only a message of deterrence against Iran or physiological deterrence against Iran, not any more.

Sputnik: Do you think Israel is able to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, does it have the capability?

Dr. Taleb Ibrahim: No, never, because let us be realistic here, Iranian nuclear facilities are buried in the depth of the ground in remote places, this is first, because when Israel bombed the Iraqi [civilian] nuclear reactor in 1982 and when they bombed Syria’s [military] facility, that attack gave a message to the Iranian leadership that something might happen in Iran.

Sputnik: How will this announcement affect Israeli-Syria relations? What impact would it have on the already tense situation in the region now?

Dr. Taleb Ibrahim: I think that the revelation about bombing the Syrian facility will add more and more tension to the explosive situation between Syria and Israel. I think Syria will finally respond to all Israeli attacks on Syrian territory that [have transpired] from 2007 until the present time, and I think the shooting down of the Israeli aircraft a few weeks ago was a message to Israel that everything is changing, the rules of the game have changed, and now Syria is much stronger than at any time in its history, it enjoys an active Russian military presence and active Russian support and active Iranian support. So I think Syria will bomb but when and how I’m not sure about that but, of course, there will be a response, and the Middle East should be stable until a permanent and just peace changes the situation between Syria and Israel.

Sputnik: What are your hopes and wishes for the future moving forward for relations between Israel and Syria? What can you advise both leaders in terms of the best advice?

Dr. Taleb Ibrahim: I think that the most important advice and the most important vital issue is to make peace between the two countries. I’ve read an article by Uri Sagi who was Director of the Israeli Military Intelligence years ago, and he said we’ve lost a very great chance when we couldn’t reach peace between Syria and Israel in the era of ex-Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin. So making peace between the two countries will stabilize the Middle East, and at that point there will be no tension even between Israel and Iran and no tension between Israel and Lebanon. I think that a permanent and complete peace in all of the region can be reached by regaining the Golan Heights and by giving the Palestinians their own state, this is something that will normalize the situation for all populations living in the area.

March 22, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

“Through Sherlock’s eyes”: the Litvinenko poisoning

OffGuardian | March 21, 2018

This short documentary film on the Litvinenko case, featuring Vasily Livanov, the Russian actor internationally celebrated for his portrayal of Sherlock Homes, makes some valid points that deserve a lot more attention than they have so far received. Made by a collective of filmmakers & investigators known as Russian Hour TV, in 2012, but unseen in the West apart from one screening at the Russian Embassy in London, this documentary examines three key questions in the official case against Lugovoi and Kovtun, the two Russians “convicted” of the murder in the bizarre and barely legal Public Inquiry of 2015.

The issues raised in this film

1. Lugovoi’s polygraph

During the filming of this documentary in 2012, the team employed a British polygraph practitioner, Bruce Burgess, to question Andrey Lugovoi, one of Litvinenko’s alleged assassins, about his alleged involvement in the murder. The interview itself doesn’t appear in the film, but we see Burgess announce the results on camera.

He says he asked Lugovoi three questions.

  1. “Did you do anything to cause the death of Alexander Litvinenko?”.To which Lugovoi answered “no”
  2. “Where you involved in any way in the death of Alexander Litvinenko?” To which Lugovoi answered “no.”
  3. “Have you ever handled polonium?” To which Lugovoi answered “no.”

According to Burgess the result was “conclusive” on all three questions. Lugovoi was “telling the truth.”

This result from a qualified polygraph examiner was, of course, completely at variance with the official story, and, though not admissible in a court of law, could be expected to impact quite a lot on the court of public opinion and on the general level of credibility surrounding the already legally questionable Inquiry. We may not be too surprised, then, that both the test itself and the man who administered it, where a) excluded from most mainstream discussion and b) when considered, made the subject of ferocious attempts to discredit them.

Burgess himself was revealed as a fairly easy target, having once given a false name after being pulled over for speeding. As a result of this offence he received a two-year suspended sentence. Much was made of this at the Inquiry by Crown barristers, but this was largely a rhetorical device and distraction.

Clearly Burgess’ essentially minor violation doesn’t impact on his professional judgement, and indeed Burgess is still a practising polygraph examiner to this day.

Moreover, despite huge efforts made by the Crown barrister, Andrew O’Connor QC, to make him retract his statement, Burgess refused to back down(see the full transcript of the testimony HERE). He went into the witness box claiming Lugovoi had passed the polygraph test and went out again saying the same thing.

Q. But in any event the outcome of the polygraph test, as we will see, was that you concluded that Mr Lugovoy was not deceiving you when he denied responsibility for Mr Litvinenko’s death?

A. That was what I concluded from the test.

Faced with this potentially devastating pointer to Lugovoi’s innocence, the Guardian, reporting the following day, handled this with its customary ethics and honesty.

Despite the fact Burgess maintained Lugovoi had passed all three parts of his polygraph test “conclusively”, and despite the fact he never wavered from this claim once in his testimony, this was the Guardian headline the following day:

“Alexander Litvinenko murder suspect failed lie detector test, court hears”

This was quite simply an absolute, unequivocal lie.

And a lie repeated and expanded in the body of the article.

We’ll be coming back to talk about that again another time.

2. Polonium

Perhaps most important section of the film is an interview with US nuclear physicist from Princeton University, Professor William Happer, who worked as a nuclear safety adviser for the U.S. Government. His testimony that polonium 210:

a) can be produced by any nuclear reactor

b) is sold and used throughout the world for industrial purposes

doesn’t accord at all with the official view on the subject which dictates that, since most polonium 210 is produced in Russia this must be assumed to indicate Russian state involvement in Litvineko’s death. But in an unbiased discussion this shouldn’t be a controversial issue. Polonium 210’s use in various industrial processes is confirmed in many online sources including this one that lists the manufacture of static eliminators as one of several uses for the isotope. In fact it’s widely available, in potentially lethal doses, in products that can be freely bought online.

Without getting into the debate on how possible/probable it is that any of these products were a source for the polonium that killed Litvinenko, the simple fact that polonium 210 is exported from Russia in its pure form to various locations, mainly the United States, for industrial application, rationally suggests it’s just as possible for the polonium that killed Litvinenko to have “gone missing” after it left Russia as before. Meaning that, while the claim that polonium 210 = “Russia did it” is not quite as absurd as the more recent claim made to the same effect about “novichoks”, it’s still far from an inevitable conclusion.

3. Where and when was Litvinenko poisoned?

The documentary raises an aspect of this question that hasn’t received much attention: how does the traces of polonium found at the Abracadabra club fit with the official timeline? According to the club’s (now deceased) owner, Litvinenko was a regular there, but didn’t visit on the night he was allegedly poisoned (November 1 2006). Luke Harding’s explanation for this errant polonium is that Lugovoi was there during an earlier and abortive attempt at killing Alexander Valterovich, and left his usual radioactive trail behind, but how much hard evidence there is for this (Harding offers none) we haven’t determined at this point.

Altogether this short film shows us how much confusion, contradiction and elision and frank deception there continues to be in this case, 12 years after Litvinenko died.

It concludes, in 2012, four years before the findings of the legal Official Inquiry were published, with an appeal to the truth-based investigative tradition embodied by Sherlock Holmes and the legendary British sense of fair play. From our current perspective, six years on, this appeal was clearly made with unwonted optimism and misplaced faith.

March 22, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Russia is fighting a lethal enemy

By Petr Akopov* | Vzgliad | March 20, 2018

London’s boorish behaviour has resulted in a fiery reaction within Russia – from indignation to jokes about “Little Britain”. Sadly, such derision is not the best possible answer. For we are dealing with a threat that is far from comical, and the entire history of relations between Russia and Britain is proof of that.

Great Britain’s behaviour in the Skripal affair is openly provocative: accusations against Russia, a recommendation to “put a sock in it”, declarations about Putin’s personal involvement. All of this, of course, is causing indignation in Russia.

But if it is possible to understand our civil society’s indignation, deriding Britain and her elites is totally incorrect. Discourse about “Little Britain”, about how “Lil’ England” has lost its influence and is slandering Russia in an impotent rage look strange. All of this is not even suitable as banal retaliatory propaganda, seeing as it is a distortion of reality.

It is in our interest to be honest. For several years now, we have been in open conflict with the global elite, with those who have a defining influence on world affairs. It is precisely this force that is now speaking through the mouths of May and Johnson. That we are calling it “Lil’ England” is a tradition of ours from the 19th century, when we found its position. In reality, it is that same international class of money and power, an elite that has once again seriously began to work on Russia. Not because of Crimea and Skripal, but as a result of our seriously blocking their path.

This is the path of globalisation a la Anglo-Saxon, i.e. the creation of a single humanity, ruled from the Western centre. “Western” is in this case a synonym for Atlantic, Anglo-Saxon. This project has been practically openly realised for the past hundred years. Through the gradual consolidation of companies and capital, through the convergence of civilisations and cultures, through their mixing and cross-pollination. Through the creation of unified global institutions of the financial, managerial, supervisory etc. type, through the formation of a new system of morals and philosophy of transhumanism. Humanity is being led to its “golden age” in which there will be no states, no nations, no sexes. Those who are against are retrogrades and conservatives, the enemies of progress and humanity. The fact that this is not yet being declared in official declarations does not mean anything; it is just a matter of time. In the meantime, Russia is being accused of totalitarianism and terrorism “like in the olden days” – this is simpler and more familiar.

Who is making the accusations? That same “world community”, which when more closely examined turns out to be the West. And when we examine it yet more closely, we find an Anglo-Saxon, i.e. an Anglo-American elite. These are the people with the “right to decide”.

Formally, they are unified in closed clubs or open orders, public societies, or secret lodges. They can be bank owners or dukes, senators or ministers. Their duties and even the size of their capital have a secondary meaning: loyalty to the group itself is most important. And for this group, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump are equally dangerous (the latter because he is a pretender, an upstart, a usurper with incorrect, non-globalist ideas). And Putin is practically openly sending a challenge by declaring that Russia will never agree with the enforced world order. What is more, Putin ridicules Western countries for not having full sovereignty.

But when Putin goes over the lack of autonomy of European countries, he hints at Germany and France or smaller states. He does not mention Great Britain. And despite the fact that America’s power is officially incomparable to Britain, in reality, it is really London that is the leader in the Atlantic tandem. Why?

Because a country’s power is not determined by aircraft carriers or the size of its economy, but by the managerial, intellectual, strategic and financial capabilities of its elite. And in this sense, the guiding and leading role of London as a “centre of power” is not doubted by anyone. It is the home of those very families that drowned the Spanish Empire, organised the Opium Wars against China, played Russia against Germany in the First World War, and bet on the collapse of Russia through the Chechen War.

These are the real players on the world chessboard. For them, the struggle against Russia is an old and traditional game.

And whose voices are used to make this clear is of little importance. That is to say, British ministers and prime ministers can be made to order for the true elite, but they can also be its direct representatives.

Winston Churchill (Duke of Marlboro) was part of the deepest core of the British elite and was prime minister at the same time. This is his main difference from Margaret Thatcher, and not in Great Britain’s influence as a country on world affairs. Yes, during Churchill’s second term the British Empire went under, but the Commonwealth of Nations remained, an organisation that unites tens of states, 15 of which still have the queen as head of state (including Canada and Australia). “Five Eyes” – a cooperation system between the intelligence agencies of the five Anglo-Saxon countries (the US, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) remained, the lashing of the US Federal Reserve system to banks from the London City remained.

Many things remained, so it is not crucially important who precisely leads the British government: Margaret Thatcher, the daughter of a greengrocer, Theresa May, daughter of a priest, Eton graduate David Cameron or aristocrat Boris Johnson (he too in time will take his seat in no. 10 Downing Street). The prime minister’s surname does not carry crucial importance. When we hear that boorish tone with which the leaders of Britain speak to us, we should understand that they are only voicing the hatred and anger that the lords of the Western world are fuelling. Those who in Soviet times were called “transnational capitalists”, are now for clearness’ sake named “Atlanticists”.

And underestimating their power is just dangerous. Several times in our history we have not just faced the guile of London, but a sudden strike as well that later turned out to be lethal for our rulers as well as our country. March 1801 and December 1916 are two very bad dates in our history. These are two murders that the Brits had a direct link to: the one of emperor Paul the First and Grigory Rasputin (which became a signal for the coup against the tsar two months later).

Now, “Lil’ England” has shown itself to be only capable of a provocation through the murder attempt on Skripal, like it had done before with Berezovsky. But this does not mean that it is incapable of more.

For four years, we have been fighting a united Western front that was organised after Crimea, and worry about unity among the ranks is now moving from Washington (where the alien Trump holds sway) to London. That is to say, it is moving closer to the real centre of power in the Western world. If we keep seeing it as Little Britain, we will not be capable of rebuilding Great Russia.

*Translated by Edvin Buday for The Saker

March 21, 2018 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Face it: Cambridge Analytica story proves Facebook doesn’t give a toss about privacy or democracy

By Danielle Ryan | RT | March 20, 2018

Mainstream media have obsessed over Russia’s alleged use of Facebook to swing the 2016 US election. In reality, it was actually a shady British data-mining firm that was running pro-Trump Facebook propaganda campaigns

Irony doesn’t feel like strong enough a word.

Which is worse: Russia allegedly buying a few hundred Facebook ads, with the goal of ‘sowing unrest’ in the United States, by exploiting already emotional and divisive issues like gun control and race relations, or Facebook allowing a dodgy British company to mine the data of millions of its users, without the users’ explicit knowledge or consent, and then using that data for political purposes?

If you need a recap: British firm Cambridge Analytica (CA), working with the Trump campaign, harvested private information from 50 million Facebook users without their knowledge — and then used that information in an attempt to influence the election in Trump’s favor. CA was reportedly paid $5 million by the Trump campaign for their efforts. Oh, and former Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon used to head the company.

So now we find out, after all the hand-wringing about how Russia elected Trump through its evil social media manipulations, that there were, in fact, other, perhaps for more influential, forces at play.

“We exploited Facebook to harvest millions of people’s profiles. And built models to exploit what we knew about them and target their inner demons. That was the basis the entire company was built on,” said CA whistleblower Christopher Wylie.

There are so many levels of irony to this story, it’s hard to know where to begin.

But let’s start with this: At the same time that Cambridge Analytica was mining Facebook data to help Trump, top executives at Facebook were actively working to help Trump opponent Hillary Clinton. Leaked emails between Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta revealed that Facebook provided research to Clinton in 2015. According to the emails, Sandberg “badly” wanted Clinton to win and she met privately with the candidate on multiple occasions.

Here’s where it gets really interesting, though. Cambridge Analytica doesn’t discriminate. After Trump’s election, the data firm’s parent company SCL Group won a contract from the US State Department to — wait for it — help combat propaganda on Facebook.

You know, it’s almost like Cambridge Analytica and Facebook each are companies primarily interested in money and which act with no moral qualms whatsoever. One can even imagine, if they try hard enough, that while Facebook executives personally seem to prefer Democrats, the company would help anyone, so long as a big fat check was involved.

Since the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke, thanks to Wylie, Facebook has tried to play the victim — and quite successfully, too, given that most of the focus has been on CA and its dirty tricks and not the fact that it is a giant data company like Facebook that allows it to happen in the first place.

Facebook claims that it was misled by CA and acted to suspend the firm from its platform. But Facebook is no victim. The social media giant still insists CA’s use of the data from 50 million of its users’ accounts was not a data breach because, somewhere within the tangle of Facebook’s intentionally complicated privacy settings, users had technically consented to having their data mined.

Don’t let Facebook’s faux outrage at CA’s behavior fool you. In the midst of all this drama, a former high-level staffer on Barack Obama’s 2012 presidential campaign has come out and admitted that Facebook allowed the Obama campaign to do much the same thing to help him, that Cambridge Analytica did to help Trump four years later.

Carol Davidsen wrote on Twitter that Facebook staff were very open and candid with the Obama campaign, writing that “they allowed us to do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to do because they were on our side”.

Those activities included “suck[ing] out the entire social graph” — in other words an individual user’s entire network of Facebook friends — in an effort to target more potential voters through friends lists.

“The privacy policies at that time on Facebook were – if they opted in, they could tell us who all their friends were. So, they told us who all their friends were. We were actually able to ingest the entire social network of the US that’s on Facebook, which is most people,” Davidsen wrote.

So who is really more to blame here? A company like Cambridge Analytica, that uses political bribes and honey traps to discredit people — or a social media giant that sells the personal data of its users to the highest bidder? Or… Russia?

I’m inclined to agree with NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, who wrote on Twitter: “Facebook makes their money by exploiting and selling intimate details about the private lives of millions, far beyond the scant details you voluntarily post. They are not victims. They are accomplices.”

Speaking of whistleblowers, it’s been interesting to see how the media has treated the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower vs. how they treat whistleblowers like Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning — and Snowden himself. When the whistleblower reveals information that suits the prevailing narrative, they are lauded as brave heroes and truth seekers. When they reveal something that doesn’t quite fit the story they are promoting, whistleblowers suddenly become abominable traitors deserving of no mercy.

Now comes the question of what should be done about all this sneaky business on Facebook. Luckily, I have a couple of suggestions.

First and foremost, Washington should immediately sanction the UK over the now-blatant attempts of a British company to meddle in and influence the American presidential election. I mean, it only seems fair. All sorts of accusations should be immediately levelled at the British government. Most importantly, absolutely no effort should be made to separate Cambridge Analytica from either Downing Street or the British public in general.

Second, the media should spend weeks, if not months, analyzing the motives of dodgy British political operatives and their efforts to secure a Trump victory. Journalists should get to work whipping up massive anti-British fervor and use any opportunity they can to get “the British” into their headlines about evil online influence campaigns.

In all honesty, there really is not much difference between Cambridge Analytica and Facebook. They both use our data for political and financial purposes — Facebook just seems to do it all on a far wider and more consistent basis.

It was only in January that Facebook admitted in a series of official blog posts, that it had a “moral duty” to understand how its technology was being used and to figure out “what can be done to make communities like Facebook as representative, civil and trustworthy as possible.” In response to allegations of Russian meddling and ‘fake news’ on the platform, Facebook said it was taking “steps in partnership with third-party fact checkers to rank these stories lower”.

That’s right: Employing unidentified “fact checkers” was supposed to help solve the fake news problem, while companies like Cambridge Analytica were out there hoovering up data from millions of users without their knowledge and using it for political propaganda purposes. But Facebook, we’re supposed to believe, knew nothing about that.

Facebook doesn’t really care a toss about your privacy or your democracy — and if this Cambridge Analytica scandal doesn’t make that clear, nothing will.

Danielle Ryan is an Irish freelance journalist. Having lived and worked in the US, Germany and Russia, she is currently based in Budapest, Hungary. Her work has been featured by Salon, The Nation, Rethinking Russia, Russia Direct, teleSUR, The BRICS Post and others. Follow her on Twitter @DanielleRyanJ, check out her Facebook page, or visit her website: danielle-ryan.com

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Tories held talks with Cambridge Analytica in 2016 – report

March 21, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Moscow: UK is Either Unable to Protect From Attack or Staged Skripal Attack

Sputnik – 21.03.2018

The Russian Foreign Ministry and Russian Defense Ministry jointly delivered a statement after a meeting with foreign envoys amid the scandal surrounding the poisoning of ex-spy Sergei Skripal.

According to the official, “either the British authorities are unable to protect from a terrorist attack on its territory or staged the attack themselves.”

“Russia owes nothing and can bear no responsibility for the actions or lack of actions on the British soil,” Ermakov added.

Moscow is surprised that UK authorities deny consular access to Skripal’s daughter in violation of international norms, Vladimir Ermakov stressed.

The attack on the Skripals is a “gross folly,” which is not beneficial to Russia, he stated.

“Moscow’s list of questions for London regarding the Skripal case is growing,” Vladimir Ermakov added.

Russia isn’t satisfied by the UK’s answers about the Skripal case, and the British have left the most important questions unanswered.

“If the subject of the investigation has not been determined reliably, and all facts are being intentionally hidden, and real evidence may have already disappeared, which has happened in the United Kingdom many times, then it is not clear what issue the UK side has,” Ermakov told a briefing.

“We took one more step forward. We suggested that the British conduct a joint investigation to identify the perpetrators of the Salisbury incident. For this, naturally, we requested access to all the case materials being investigated by Scotland Yard. Without this, it is simply impossible to get a clear picture of what is really happening,” Vladimir Ermakov said.

Earlier, OPCW confirmed that Russia had preliminarily destroyed all chemical weapons in its arsenal, the official said.

“The West is ready to use any means it can to discredit Russia, incidents in Khan Sheikhoun show that,” Vladimir Ermakov said.

The closest UK ally is the only state having the biggest chemical weapons’ arsenal in the world, he added.

Russia is interested that there are no questions between Moscow and the West regarding Skripal; from the British side there is no such approach, Ermakov said, adding that Russia is “shocked by statements made by UK politicians.”

According to a British Embassy’s representative, London wants explanations whether Russia produced a substance dubbed ‘Novichok.’

In his turn, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s official has emphasized that Moscow had repeatedly asked for a joint probe into the Skripal case and access to its materials, including the poisonous substance.

“In conclusion I would like to stress that we are closely following the developments of the Skripal case… I am sure that in time the authors and the participants of this provocation will be punished… I would like to additionally stress that Russia does not accuse anyone of anything,” Ermakov told a briefing.

As Russia did not produce any unrepresented chemical substances under the OPCW convention, there are no such reserves in Russia.

Russia gave the Czech Republic evidence proving statements on the country’s possibility to develop poisoning substances.

When asked by deputy Slovak Ambassador to Moscow about the statement made by Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, the ministry’s official stated that “Slovakia was mentioned as [former] part Czechoslovakia.”

Russian MoD Comments on Skripal Case

The Russian Defense Ministry has commented on allegations of Damascus’ use of chemical weapons.

According to a ministry’s official, the Syrian Foreign Ministry had informed Moscow that tons of poisonous substances had been found after liberation of territories from militants.

Busted chemical provocations in Syria ‘destroyed coalition’s plans to launch strike’ against Damascus, according to Russian Defense Ministry.

“It seems that Britain is afraid to conduct an unbiased investigation” into the Skripal case, Russian Defense Ministry representative added.

The UK presented no proof that gas allegedly used to poison Skripal was made in Russia, he added.

The United Kingdom first synthesized the VX nerve agent in 1962, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.

The formula of the substance dubbed ‘Novichok’ was published by the scientist Mirzayanov, who is working under the US government, according to Russian Defense Ministry.

The ministry has suggested that Mirzayanov under US influence could have written in his book the formula of the poisonous substance, allegedly used to poison Skripal.

“It is a gross violation of the Convention on the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons,” Russian official said.

According to the ministry, Britain “was and is one of the states that have been implementing a program on the development of new chemical weapons since 1970s.”

He added that the Porton Down lab in Britain is used to conduct experiments, involving use of chemical weapons.

The patent for the British-developed toxic substance was later sold the US, the Russian Defense Ministry representative stressed.

Russia has questions about the UK sending about 50mln pounds to Porton Down laboratory, and whether they are trying to destroy Novichok there, Russian Defense Ministry representative added.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that all foreign ambassadors to Russia have been invited to attend a meeting on Wednesday. While EU ambassadors, except Britain, have agreed to attend the meeting, the US envoy hasn’t taken part in the talks.

Earlier, UK Prime Minister Theresa May said that it was “highly likely” that Russia was responsible for the Salisbury incident.

Yesterday, Russian diplomats had to leave the UK as British Prime Minister Theresa May announced a batch of anti-Russia measures in the wake of the poisoning of the ex-Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal, the incident which was blamed on Moscow.

The Russian Foreign Ministry denied all the allegations and requested the UK to allow a joint investigation into the case.

March 21, 2018 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Israel admits to launching military attack on Syria in 2007, warns region of more

Press TV – March 21, 2018

Israel has formally admitted that it had attacked and destroyed a site in eastern Syria back in 2007, warning the region of more such assaults.

The announcement by the Israeli military through declassified documents came on Wednesday about “Operation Out of the Box” against what Israel claims to be a nuclear reactor in Syria’s eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr.

For over 10 years, the Israeli military had prohibited discussions about the already well-known and widely reported secret.

The new declassified materials included photographs and cockpit video said to show the moment that an airstrike targeted Syria’s Al-Kubar facility.

According to the Jerusalem Post, the Mossad confirmed the existence of the Syrian site in March 2007. In the months that followed, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert tried to pressure former US President George W. Bush to attack the site.

In July 2007, after Bush refused Israel’s demands, Olmert convened his security cabinet, which ultimately concluded that the alleged reactor had to be destroyed.

Before midnight on September 5, 2007, four F-15 jets and four F-16 warplanes entered the Syrian airspace via Turkey, dropping nearly 17 tons of bombs on the facility.

On Wednesday, the Israeli minister for military affairs, Avigdor Lieberman, said the 2007 strike was a message to Israel’s enemies.

He claimed, “The motivation of our enemies has increased in recent years, but the strength of our army, our air force and our intelligence capabilities have increased compared with the capabilities we had in 2007.”

Syria, a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), has always dismissed reports that the site was a nuclear reactor. Damascus said that the destroyed complex was a military site under construction.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad vehemently denied that his country had built a nuclear reactor in violation of its commitments under the NPT and to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

In 2017, Syria’s Permanent Representative at the UN Bashar al-Ja’afari lashed out at the Security Council and the IAEA for their failure to denounce Israel’s blatant military attack in 2007, noting that Israel refused to cooperate with the IAEA in investigating the possible contamination caused by the Israeli rockets and the materials used to destroy the site.

Israel is believed to be the sole possessor of a nuclear arsenal in the Middle East with more than 200 undeclared nuclear warheads. Tel Aviv has rejected global calls to join the NPT and does not allow international inspectors to observe its controversial nuclear program.

Syria has on numerous occasions slammed the Western countries for supplying Israel with nuclear materials in a blatant violation of the NPT and even helping it to keep its nuclear activities secret.

There has been a sharp hike in Israeli acts of aggression against Syria since 2011, when the Arab country plunged into a foreign-backed crisis targeting the government in Damascus.

Israel has, ever since, launched military attacks on targets in Syria in an apparent attempt to prop up terrorist groups that have been suffering heavy defeats on the battlefield with Syrian government forces, who are fighting to liberate the countries from the clutches of foreign-backed militant groups.

The latest such attacks took place on February 20, when Israeli warplanes bombed a Syrian army facility in central Syria. The Syrian military hit at least one Israeli F-16 returning from the bombing raid.

On several occasions, the Syrian army has confiscated Israeli-made arms and military equipment from militants fighting pro-Damascus forces. Israel has also been providing medical treatment to the extremist militants wounded in Syria.

March 21, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

American Public Troubled by “Deep State”

By John V. Walsh | Dissident Voice | March 20, 2018

“Public Troubled by Deep State” is the headline that the Monmouth University Polling Institute tags to its recent poll.

Polling about the term “Deep State” is problematical, because as the polling report says:

Few Americans (13%) are very familiar with the term “Deep State;” another 24% are somewhat familiar, while 63% say they are not familiar with this term.

So the careful pollsters at Monmouth defined the term as follows for their interviewees:

The term Deep State refers to the possible existence of a group of unelected government and military officials who secretly manipulate or direct national policy.

Then they asked whether such a group exists.

Monmouth reports the results as follows:

Nearly 3-in-4 (74%) say they believe this type of apparatus exists in Washington. This includes 27% who say it definitely exists and 47% who say it probably exists. Only 1-in-5 say it does not exist (16% probably not and 5% definitely not).

Furthermore, these opinions do not follow a partisan divide.  The report continues:

Belief in the probable existence of a Deep State comes from more than 7-in-10 Americans in each partisan group, although Republicans (31%) and independents (33%) are somewhat more likely than Democrats (19%) to say that the Deep State definitely exists.

This leads the director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute, Patrick Murray, to volunteer:

We usually expect opinions on the operation of government to shift depending on which party is in charge. But there’s an ominous feeling by Democrats and Republicans alike that a ‘Deep State’ of unelected operatives are pulling the levers of power.

In addition, there are some significant but not drastic racial and ethnic differences on this question.  Says the Report:

Americans of black, Latino and Asian backgrounds (35%) are more likely than non-Hispanic whites (23%) to say that the Deep State definitely exists.

The report also asked about government surveillance of the citizenry and here again there is widespread concern: Fully 8-in-10 believe that the U.S. government currently monitors or spies on the activities of American citizens, including a majority (53%) who say this activity is widespread and another 29% who say such monitoring happens but is not widespread. Just 14% say this monitoring does not happen at all. There are no substantial partisan differences in these results.

This too causes the director of the Institute to be concerned. “This is a worrisome finding. The strength of our government relies on public faith in protecting our freedoms, which is not particularly robust. And it’s not a Democratic or Republican issue. These concerns span the political spectrum,” says director Murray.

We can add to the concern about a manipulative unelected apparatus at work in the government the widespread distrust of the press summarized in this recent Gallup/Knight poll:

Today, 66% of Americans say most news media do not do a good job of separating fact from opinion. In 1984, 42% held this view.

Less than half of Americans, 44%, say they can think of a news source that reports the news objectively.

On a multiple-item media trust scale with scores ranging from a low of zero to a high of 100, the average American scores a 37.

This paints a pretty grim picture of trust in both our government and our media. Perhaps “Deep Media” should be a term added to “Deep State.” But perhaps it is cause for optimisim. It seems that people are waking up and thinking for themselves. That is bad news for the organs of control and propaganda that direct our lives.  And perhaps it is good news for those who try to fight the endless wars we experience and who feel that it is the Deep State that gins them up and the mainstream media that creates the environment for them.  Skepticism is the first step in getting to the truth and escaping domination.

John V. Walsh can be reached at john.endwar@gmail.com.

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | | Leave a comment

Anthrax: The Forgotten Lie

OffGuardian | March 20, 2018

Fifteen years ago today, March 20, the “Coalition of the Willing” declared war on Iraq. We now know that war was based on a monumental and inexcusable lie about Iraq possessing “weapons of mass destruction”, and that the war itself was a crime under international law. But we tend to forget that WMDs wasn’t the only lie told to us at the time. There was also the lie about the anthrax attacks in the USA, which in some ways can be counted even more egregious and cold-blooded.

We were told the anthrax that killed five people and harmed 17 others had been positively identified as originating in Iraq. Colin Powell’s famous “test tube full of washing powder” was a bit of theatre designed to sell us on this alleged fact. But it wasn’t true.

Almost immediately after the attacks the FBI knew the anthrax must have been homegrown, or at least produced somewhere with sophisticated laboratory equipment. But since this fact didn’t fit with the al Qaeda narrative it was suppressed from public knowledge. By October 2001 the Guardian was reporting “Iraq ‘behind US anthrax outbreaks’.” All the usual suspects in promoting imperialist war soon followed suit.

The narrative at this time was clearly intended to be that Iraq was the state-sponsor of al Qaeda terror, and had not only been a supporter of the 9/11 attacks but had provided Osama’ boys with the goods to murder even more Americans with anthrax. This, obviously, was intended to act as the rationale for attacking those two vitally strategic countries in the the US’s project for dominance in the Middle east and Asia – Iraq and Afghanistan.

But, as so often seems to happen, this narrative was almost immediately undermined by official White House statements (perhaps originating in elements of the government anxious to preserve the administration from outright association with a lie) that the anthrax in question showed no signs of coming from Iraq, because they specifically lacked an ingredient called bentonite. Which, as we now know, was true.

This official denial, based on solid scientific evidence, should have been an end to the story. But, as the film above shows, owing to a vast campaign of distraction and deception by politicians and the media, the completely discredited story of Iraqi responsibility for the anthrax attacks continued to flourish and even gain momentum. Outlets such as ABC and, most prominently, from Judith Miller (whose pre-2001 prescience about the dangers of anthrax in the US seems truly breathtaking) in the New York Times, brazenly continued to sell the idea in feature articles, specials and endless repetition in the nightly news.

And what was the central “fact” on which the media story of Iraq’s guilt was built?

Nothing less than the completely and provably false claim the White House had already denied – that there was bentonite in the anthrax.

Even the White House, the same White House that had officially denied the presence of bentonite and therefore ruled out Iraq involvement, continue to use implications, lies by omission and weasel words to enable the opposite view to become lodged in the public mind.

These people didn’t just bend the truth, or fudge or obfuscate. They lied. They invented whole narratives, they made up whole back stories, they looked us in the camera’s eye on TV and completely deceived us. The media’s Anthrax Meme never existed. Not one single part of it. And even while Colin Powell was allowing us to believe the story he had known for more than a year that it was a complete fabrication

The UK government is currently lying to us about the Skripal poisoning. We know that already to be beyond doubt. The only question is how deep the lie goes this time.

When we look back at 2001 we have to realise it could be very deep indeed.

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | Leave a comment

Scramble for Syria opens up disturbing scenarios

By M K Bhadrakumar | Indian Punchline | March 20, 2018

The US State Department issued a strong statement on March 19 following the fall of Afrin, the Kurdish city in northwestern Syria to the Turkish forces. The statement is highly critical of Turkey’s military operation in Afrin. It expresses concern over the humanitarian situation and of looting in Afrin by the occupation forces. Importantly, it alleges once again that the Turkish operation “has distracted from the ‘Defeat ISIS’ campaign and provided opportunity for ISIS to begin reconstituting in some areas. This is a serious and growing concern.”

The statement can be seen as an expression of sympathy toward the Kurds who suffered a crushing defeat in Afrin. This is the least that Washington could do to salvage its reputation among the Kurds. The US claims that it “does not operate in the area of northwest Syria, where Afrin is located. We remain committed to our NATO ally Turkey, to include their legitimate security concerns.” But Turkish President Recep Erdogan has contradicted the US stance of non-involvement in Afrin. He now alleges that the US tried to “deceive” Turkey. Erdogan said today in Ankara at a meeting of the ruling party,

  • “If we are strategic partners, you (US) will have to respect us and move along with us. You tried to deceive us. You sent 5,000 trucks of weapons there. You sent more than 2,000 trucks of ammunition there. We wanted weapons from you to buy with our money, but you did not give any to us. What kind of a strategic partnership or solidarity is this?”
  • “The U.S. spokesperson makes a comment and says, ‘We are concerned about the situation in Afrin.’ Where were you when we transmitted our concerns to you? Where were you when we said ‘let’s clean the terrorist organization from there?”

It is apparent that Washington is indulging in doublespeak. At any rate, Washington’s priority at the moment will be to pile pressure on Turkey over the chaotic situation in Afrin (which was captured by Turkish forces on March 18) and, in reality, to somehow dissuade Erdogan from extending the military operation to the northeastern region (east of Afrin), which are under the control of the Kurdish militia and the US forces.

Erdogan is keeping the Americans on tenterhooks as regards his next move. He asserted on Monday that Turkish troops would indeed press eastward, targeting territory where US forces are stationed, all the way into Iraq’s Sinjar Mountains. There is no reason to disbelieve him. The point is, there is massive popular support in Turkey for Erdogan’s muscular policy towards the Kurds – and for standing up to the US. In political terms, Erdogan can hope to exploit the wave of nationalism sweeping Turkey. The parliamentary and presidential elections are due next year in Turkey.

Unsurprisingly, Moscow and Tehran have kept quiet and left the field to Turkey and the US to throw brickbats at each other. They have reason to be pleased that the US is unable to protect the Kurdish militia, its key ally in Syria, from the Turkish assault. Besides, they are able to press ahead with their own operations against the extremist forces (that used to be previously aligned with the US and Turkey) in Ghouta in eastern Damascus and Idlib province in the extreme northwest.

Evidently, from the Russian and Iranian perspective, Erdogan is doing a magnificent job by undermining the US strategy in Syria to maintain an open-ended military presence. The Kurdish militia who are having an existential fight on their hands with the Turkish military are not going to be in a position to be the US’ proxies for very long.

On the other hand, Russia and Iran also remain wary of Turkey’s intentions, especially a Turkish attempt to create a ‘buffer zone’ in northern Syria. As it is, the US has carved out a huge swathe of land in northern Syria east of Euphrates, which comprises some of Syria’s best agricultural lands and water resources and over half of Syria’s entire oil and gas fields. (A trilateral Turkish-Russian-Iranian presidential summit is due to take place in Istanbul on April 4.)

Another complicating factor is that Russia has its own interests to pursue vis-à-vis Turkey and the Kurds. Then, there is also the overarching US-Russia competition to placate Turkey. All in all, the Syrian war is not ending as many observers had earlier envisaged, but is actually mutating into new forms. Read an insightful interview, here, with a leading expert on Syria, Professor Joshua Landis, Director of the Centre for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma.

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Deception | , , , , | Leave a comment

D’un Type Développé par des Menteurs

By Craig Murray | March 20, 2018

Those who have so kindly followed my analysis of the Skripal case so far will not have been surprised by this formulation appearing yet again in today’s European Union statement:

The European Union strongly condemns the attack that took place against Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury, UK on 4 March 2018, that also left a police officer seriously ill. The lives of many citizens were threatened by this reckless and illegal act. The European Union takes extremely seriously the UK government’s assessment that it is highly likely that the Russian Federation is responsible.
The European Union is shocked at the offensive use of any military-grade nerve agent, of a type developed by Russia, for the first time on European soil in over 70 years. The use of chemical weapons by anyone under any circumstances is completely unacceptable and constitutes a security threat to us all. Any such use is a clear violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, a breach of international law and undermines the rules-based international order. The EU welcomes the commitment of the UK to work closely with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in supporting the investigation into the attack. The union calls on Russia to address urgently the questions raised by the UK and the international community and to provide immediate, full and complete disclosure of its novichok programme to the OPCW.
The European Union expresses its unqualified solidarity with the UK and its support, including for the UK’s efforts to bring those responsible for this crime to justice.
The EU will remain closely focussed on this issue and its implications.

While Boris Johnson may spout off the cuff lies while giving TV interviews, when it comes to any formal document or statement – in parliament, the Security Council, NATO and now the EU – the British government always reverts to this precise formulation “of a type developed by Russia” which attempts to disguise the fact that they have no evidence the material is made in Russia. Many laboratories can produce “novichoks”.

The EU statement very obviously eschews the British government line that Russia is evidently to blame. “The European Union takes extremely seriously the UK government’s assessment” is a double edged statement. Of course such a profound accusation must be taken seriously – whether the accusation redounds eventually to the discredit of the accused and accuser is a different question. There is something patronising about the “takes extremely seriously” line.

As in “we take the views of our customers extremely seriously. Unfortunately none of our agents is available right now, please continue to hold…” followed by thirty minutes of jingle then cuts off. I am told the French text sounds still more disdainful.

Apparently the BBC’s Eddie Mair on the PM programme on BBC Radio 4 today did take up the subject of the peculiar wording “of a type developed by Russia”, though without reaching any conclusion. He mentioned me by name. Now both the UK’s main political radio programmes – PM and Today – have mentioned me by name and discussed my ideas, but neither has given me a chance to reply. Mair is interesting – he first interviewed me on Radio Tay in 1984. He was then a brilliant young school-leaver who looked 12 years old, and came from the Whitfield housing scheme in Dundee, then one of the most deprived and toughest estates in the entire UK. It is a shame that his talent and energy have been wasted in the BBC, but his background does perhaps lead him to go outside the Establishment consensus sometimes.

As it is, here I am on some “fringe” media outlets today, which there are increasing calls from MPs of all major parties to close down, so that non-Establishment views can be completely suppressed.

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism | , | Leave a comment

Former CIA Chief Brennan Running Scared

By Ray McGovern | Consortium News | March 19, 2018

What prompted former CIA Director John Brennan on Saturday to accuse President Donald Trump of “moral turpitude” and to predict, with an alliterative flourish, that Trump will end up “as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history”? The answer shines through the next sentence in Brennan’s threatening tweet: “You may scapegoat Andy McCabe [former FBI Deputy Director fired Friday night] but you will not destroy America… America will triumph over you.”

Former CIA Director John Brennan

It is easy to see why Brennan lost it. The Attorney General fired McCabe, denying him full retirement benefits, because McCabe “had made an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and lacked candor — including under oath — on multiple occasions.” There but for the grace of God go I, Brennan must have thought, whose stock in trade has been unauthorized disclosures.

In fact, Brennan can take but small, short-lived consolation in the fact that he succeeded in leaving with a full government pension. His own unauthorized disclosures and leaks probably dwarf in number, importance, and sensitivity those of McCabe. And many of those leaks appear to have been based on sensitive intercepted conversations from which the names of American citizens were unmasked for political purposes. Not to mention the leaks of faux intelligence like that contained in the dubious “dossier” cobbled together for the Democrats by British ex-spy Christopher Steele.

It is an open secret that the CIA has been leaking like the proverbial sieve over the last two years or so to its favorite stenographers at the New York Times and Washington Post. (At one point, the obvious whispering reached the point that the Wall Street Journal saw fit to complain that it was being neglected.) The leaking can be traced way back — at least as far as the Clinton campaign’s decision to blame the Russians for the publication of very damning DNC emails by WikiLeaks just three days before the Democratic National Convention.

This blame game turned out to be a hugely successful effort to divert attention from the content of the emails, which showed in bas relief the dirty tricks the DNC played on Bernie Sanders. The media readily fell in line, and all attention was deflected from the substance of the DNC emails to the question as to why the Russians supposedly “hacked into the DNC and gave the emails to WikiLeaks.”

This media operation worked like a charm, but even Secretary Clinton’s PR person, Jennifer Palmieri, conceded later that at first it strained credulity that the Russians would be doing what they were being accused of doing.

Magnificent Diversion

On April 6, 2017 I attended a panel discussion on “Russia’s interference in our democracy” at the Clinton/Podesta Center for American Progress Fund. In my subsequent write-up I noted that panelist Palmieri had inadvertently dropped tidbits of evidence that I suggested “could get some former officials in deep kimchi – if a serious investigation of leaking, for example, were to be conducted.” (That time seems to be coming soon.)

Palmieri was asked to comment on “what was actually going on in late summer/early fall [2016].” She answered:

“It was a surreal experience … so I did appreciate that for the press to absorb … the idea that behind the stage that the Trump campaign was coordinating with Russia to defeat Hillary Clinton was too fantastic for people to, um, for the press to process, to absorb….

“But then we go back to Brooklyn [Clinton headquarters] and heard from the — mostly our sources were other intelligence, with the press who work in the intelligence sphere, and that’s where we heard things and that’s where we learned about the dossier and the other story lines that were swirling about; and how to process … And along the way the administration started confirming various pieces of what they were concerned about what Russia was doing. … So I do think that the answer for the Democrats now … in both the House and the Senate is to talk about it more and make it more real.”

So the leaking had an early start, and went on steroids during the months following the Democratic Convention up to the election — and beyond.

As a Reminder

None of the leaking, unmasking, surveillance, or other activities directed against the Trump campaign can be properly understood, if one does not bear in mind that it was considered a sure thing that Secretary Clinton would become President, at which point illegal and extralegal activities undertaken to help her win would garner praise, not prison.

But she lost. And a month ago, House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes (R-CA) threw down the gauntlet, indicating that there could be legal consequences, for example, for officials who misled the FISA court in order to enable surveillance on Trump and associates. His words are likely to have sent chills down the spine of yet other miscreants. “If they need to be put on trial, we will put them on trial,” he said. “The reason Congress exists is to oversee these agencies that we created.”

John Brennan is widely reported to be Nunes’s next target. Does one collect a full pension in jail?

Unmasking: Senior national security officials are permitted to ask the National Security Agency to unmask the names of Americans in intercepted communications for national security reasons — not for domestic political purposes. Congressional committees have questioned why Obama’s UN ambassador Samantha Power (as well as his national security adviser Susan Rice) made so many unmasking requests. Power is reported to have requested the unmasking of more than 260 Americans, most of them in the final days of the administration, including the names of Trump associates.

Deep State Intimidation 

Back to John Brennan’s bizarre tweet Saturday telling the President, “You may scapegoat Andy McCabe but you will not destroy America … America will triumph over you.” Unmasking the word “America,” so to speak, one can readily discern the name “Brennan” underneath. Brennan’s words and attitude are a not-so-subtle reminder of the heavy influence and confidence of the deep state, including the media — exercised to a fare-thee-well over the past two years.

Later on Saturday, Samantha Power, with similar equities at stake, put an exclamation point behind what Brennan had tweeted earlier in the day. Power also saw fit to remind Trump where the power lies, so to speak. She warned him publicly that it is “not a good idea to piss off John Brennan.”

Meanwhile, the Washington Post is dutifully playing its part in the deep-state game of intimidation. The following excerpt from Sunday’s lead article conveys the intended message: “Some Trump allies say they worry he is playing with fire by taunting the FBI. ‘This is open, all-out war. And guess what? The FBI’s going to win,’ said one ally, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid. ‘You can’t fight the FBI. They’re going to torch him.’” [sic]

The Post, incidentally, waited until paragraph 41 of 44 to inform readers that it was the FBI’s own Office of Professional Responsibility and the Inspector General of the Department of Justice that found McCabe guilty, and that the charge was against McCabe, not the FBI. A quite different impression was conveyed by the large headline “Trump escalates attacks on FBI” as well as the first 40 paragraphs of Sunday’s lead article.

Putting Down a Marker

It isn’t as though Donald Trump wasn’t warned, as are all incoming presidents, of the power of the Deep State that he needs to play ball with — or else. Recall that just three days before President-elect Trump was visited by National Intelligence Director James Clapper, FBI Director James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and NSA Director Michael Rogers, Trump was put on notice by none other than the Minority Leader of the Senate, Chuck Schumer.  Schumer has been around and knows the ropes; he is a veteran of 18 years in the House, and is in his 20th year in the Senate.

On Jan. 3, 2017 Schumer said it all, when he told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, that President-elect Trump is “being really dumb” by taking on the intelligence community and its assessments on Russia’s cyber activities:

“Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you,” Schumer told Maddow. “So even for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he’s being really dumb to do this.” Did Maddow ask Schumer if he was saying President of the United States should be afraid of the intelligence community? No, she let Schumer’s theorem stand.

With gauntlets now thrown down by both sides, we may not have to wait very long to see if Schumer is correct in his blithe prediction as to how the present constitutional crisis will be resolved.

Ray McGovern works for Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington.  He served as a CIA analyst under seven Presidents and nine CIA directors and is now on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

March 19, 2018 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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