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German Authorities Detain Drunken US Soldier Who Bit, Referred to Them as ‘Nazis’

Sputnik -17.06.2020

A drunken US Army soldier of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment was tied up and arrested by six German police officers in Nuremberg, Germany, on Saturday after he reportedly assaulted arresting officers and referred to them as Nazis.

An unnamed 22-year-old of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment based in Vilseck, Germany, could soon find himself facing assault charges under the US’ Uniform Code of Military Justice, following allegations of an aggressive and drunken encounter with German police officers over the weekend, according to Stars and Stripes.

Prior to being identified as a member of the US Army, the 22-year-old was reported to German authorities over his aggressive behavior toward staff at a Nuremberg train station.

“Due to the [intoxication] and the aggressive behavior, the identity of the man could not be determined on the scene,” police said, as reported by Stars and Stripes.

Cops initially handcuffed the drunken American, who then began to shout epithets, such as calling them Nazis, and kicked the arresting officers with his cowboy boots.

German officers responded to the resistance by tying up the soldier’s legs and hauling him off to the local police station. Authorities allege the American drew blood from an officer after biting his leg during a search.

Authorities told Stars and Stripes that the cop in question was taken to a hospital and “is currently not able to work.”

The American soldier has since been released to the US military.

Maj. John Ambelang, spokesperson for the 2nd Cavalry Regiment, confirmed to the outlet that the unit “is aware of an incident involving a soldier” and “takes unlawful violence toward others very seriously.”

June 19, 2020 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation | , | Leave a comment

Jacob Cohen: “The Zionists Have Become Masters in The Art of Propaganda”

Interview realized by Mohsen Abdelmoumen | American Herald Tribune | June 12, 2020

Mohsen Abdelmoumen: What is your analysis of the annexation of the West Bank this July 1?

Jacob Cohen: The Zionist regime is not crazy enough to annex the entire West Bank, because then it would have to naturalize all Palestinians. It only wants to annex the “useful” West Bank, i.e. the Jordan Valley, thus preventing a possible Palestinian State to control its own borders and the large Jewish settlement blocs. It would thus continue to have a submissive and cheap labor force at its disposal, and the cooperation of a docile Palestinian police force to maintain colonial order.

It is not sure that this annexation will take place on July 1. Zionists are pragmatic people and know how to step back to jump better.

But in any case, annexation or not, the Zionists will never give up these territories they claim. The Jordan Valley is already implicitly recognized to them by all the great powers, even Russia, to ensure “the security of Israel”. And no one can imagine that the Zionist regime would bring 700,000 settlers below the Green Line.

These are the main lines of a possible Israeli-Palestinian agreement, and the Palestinian Authority pretends to believe, madly or stupidly, that it could recover the whole of the West Bank.

How do you explain that twenty ministers of the Israeli government are of Moroccan origin? Israeli security and defense companies are based in Morocco. How do you analyze these facts? Is not Morocco a real launching pad for the normalization policy advocated by the Zionist entity of Israel?

Only ten ministers have a distant connection with Morocco, which they do not care about. It is the Judeo-Zionist lobby in Morocco, led by the “sayan” (Mossad agent) André Azoulay, advisor to the monarchy for forty years, who does everything to maintain the illusion of perfect understanding between Morocco and its former Jewish citizens. Everything is done in Morocco to rekindle an almost extinguished flame. This to allow the visit of Israelis to Morocco, tourists, artists, businessmen, to push towards an official normalization of Israeli-Moroccan relations.

It is true that Morocco, since the installation of Mossad in that country in the 1950s to send Moroccan Jews to Israel, and the agreement obtained from Hassan II in 1961 for this purpose, is Israel’s de facto ally and support for its legitimization in the Arab world. In 1986, in the middle of the Intifada, the King received with great pomp the Israeli leaders Rabin and Peres.

Furthermore Morocco, on the other hand, which needs American diplomatic support to ensure its stranglehold on Western Sahara, does everything possible to please Israel, whose influence on American institutions is known.

How do you explain the strategic redeployment of the Zionist entity of Israel throughout Africa?

This redeployment had begun in the fields of construction and agriculture as early as the 1960s, after African independences. A redeployment stopped by the June 1967 war and the military occupation of vast Arab territories. The non-aligned movement at the time was still very influential.

The Oslo Accords restored some good repute to the Zionist regime, because it was assumed that it would give a State to the Palestinians in the long run.

Africa from the 1990s was no longer this non-aligned bloc sensitive to a form of international justice. It had joined the globalist circuit and security issues had become paramount.

Israel had become an important and feared partner. Did it not contribute to the amputation of the southern part of Sudan? Its networks in East Africa are very active and their strike force is well known.

Finally, little by little, the Zionist regime has managed, something inconceivable 20 years ago, to win the diplomatic support of many African countries in crucial votes in international institutions.

Algeria is one of the few countries that does not recognize Israel. Doesn’t Algeria still remain a permanent target of the Zionist entity of Israel?

All Arab countries are a permanent target of the Zionist entity. Even countries that submit are not definitively spared. Thus, even Morocco is not immune to Mossad’s attempts to stir up separatism in the Berber areas. If for no other reason than to keep the pressure on this country and make it understand that it has an interest in keeping its nose clean.

Let us remember the fate of Iraq and Syria, which the Zionist regime contributed to destroying.

Algeria will not escape the Zionist vindictiveness, which will try to reach it in one way or another. But this country is far away, not very sensitive to foreign influence, sitting on a large income, with a long history of national resistance, and a strong sense of patriotism. This is what makes it one of the few countries to stand up to the Zionist entity. And because of its geographical position and size, it is a country that is essential to regional security and therefore preserved.

We know the weight of the Zionist lobby in the United States through AIPAC. What is the weight of the Zionist lobby in Europe?

No difference except from a formal point of view. In the United States, the Zionist lobby has a legal existence, with its recognized networks of influence, its buildings in Washington and elsewhere, its congresses, where any candidate for an important post, be it senator or president, must appear and express his support to Israel.

Whereas in Europe, the lobby is more discreet but no less effective. Practically all European countries have banned the BDS movement, and adopted the definition of anti-Semitism proposed by a Jewish organization fighting against the “Shoah”. With this in particular that any criticism of Israel is equated with anti-Semitism. European countries have not even been able to implement their resolution to label products that come from the Zionist settlements in the West Bank.

In France, at the CRIF (note: Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France) dinner, the entire establishment of the French Republic, including the President, bowed down and received instructions from the Judeo-Zionist lobby.

The European Union has set up a body to combat anti-Semitism headed by the German Katharina Von Schnurbein. How do you explain the fact that the European Union is setting up a body to defend Israel’s interests with European taxpayers’ money and that there is no hesitation in condemning all those who are against the criminal and fascist policies of Israel by calling them anti-Semites?

“Antisemitism” has been an extraordinary discovery of the Judeo-Zionist lobby in Europe. Of course, we know the history of the Second World War. But for the past 30 years or so, this lobby has been working hard to make it the greatest scourge of the 21st century. A few arranged or staged attacks, a few so-called verbal aggressions, a few desecrations that come in at the right time, a swastika lost here or there, and all the media networks are being used to make it look like there’s a resurgence of anti-Semitism. European governments are under pressure. They cannot afford any weakness.

But from criticism of Israel, we move on to anti-Semitism. The argument is fallacious, but it works. When you criticize Israel, you stir up “hatred” against that country and European Jewish citizens, and thus anti-Semitic aggression. Therefore, Israel should not be criticized. Anti-Zionism becomes an offense because it is equated with anti-Semitism. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations are banned because they lead to anti-Semitism.

Anti-Semitism has become a kind of blank cheque given to the Zionists to do whatever they like in Palestine without being worried, condemned or criticized.

You are a great anti-Zionist activist and a defender of the just cause of the Palestinian people. In your book “Le printemps des Sayanim” (The Spring of the Sayanim), you talk about the role of the sayanim in the world. Can you explain to our readership what sayanim are and what exactly is their role?

The “sayanim”, in Hebrew “those who help”, are Jews who live outside Israel and who, by Zionist patriotism, collaborate with the Mossad in their fields of activity.

They were created as early as 1959 by the Mossad chief at the time, Méir Amit. They’re probably between 40,000 and 50,000. Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent and refugee in Canada, talks about it for certain cases. He estimated that in the 1980s, in London alone, there were 3,000 sayanim.

What is their utility? Mossad recruits sayanim who work voluntarily in all major areas. For example, the media: these Jewish journalists or press bosses around the world will orient information in such a way as to favor Israel at the expense of Arabs.

In the United States, the Jewish power in the film industry is well known. Just an example. In 1961, Hollywood produced the film “Exodus” with Paul Newman, which tells the story of the birth of Israel in 1948 from a Zionist point of view. This film has shaped Western consciousness for at least a generation.

The same could be said for the financial institutions based in New York and dominated by Judeo-Zionists.

In France, advertising, publishing, the press, television, university, etc. are more or less controlled by “sayanim”.

It is therefore easy to understand the Zionist lobby’s strike force, a strike force that remains moreover invisible.

Isn’t Zionism, which is the direct product of the Talmud and the Jewish Kabbalah, an ideology that is both racist and fascist?

If we take Zionism in its political sense, that is, in the nationalist vision of the political movements of the 19th century, it was a secular and progressive ideology. It had seduced tens of thousands of activists, particularly in Russia and Poland, who sought to realize their revolutionary ideal outside the progressive movements of the time. They wanted to transform the Jewish people, to make it “normal”.

Despite these characteristics, these activists, upon arriving in Palestine, had excluded the Arabs from their national project from the outset. The seeds of racism were already planted. The Arabs had to be expelled or got rid of somehow. Even the kibbutzim, the flagships of “Zionist socialism”, did not admit Arabs within them.

Wars and conquests, especially of the “biblical” cities in the West Bank, have plunged Israeli society into a messianic fascism and racism that is no longer even hidden. The latest “Law on the Nation of the Jewish People” clearly establishes racist elements, such as the possibility for a Jewish municipality to refuse Arab inhabitants, even though they have Israeli nationality.

Doesn’t the just cause of the Palestinian people need a more intense mobilization in the face of the criminal offensives of the fascist Israeli colonial army? Don’t you think that the role of BDS is very important to counter Israeli fascism?

For the reasons I mentioned earlier, the Zionist regime has managed to stifle, at least in part, the legitimate demands of the Palestinian people. As far as the media and relations with the governments of the major powers are concerned, the balance is tipped in favor of Zionism. That’s a fact. Even the majority of Arab countries, for reasons that cannot be confessed, are turning away from it.

BDS is an extraordinary weapon, but as I said, it is increasingly banned in the West because it is considered as an ” anti-Semitic ” movement. It’s absurd, sure, but it’s so. Example: Germany withdrew a European prize from a woman writer because she had tweeted pro-BDS a few months before.

How do you explain that at a time when freedom-loving Westerners support BDS, Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia, Emirates, Qatar, etc. are normalizing their relations with the Zionist entity of Israel as part of the “deal of the century” spearheaded by Jared Kushner?

Historically, these monarchies have never supported the Palestinians, or at least with lip service, because they feared the revolutionary potential of the Palestinian movements in the 60s and 70s. The Arab world was then divided between “conservatives” and “progressives”. Following the example of Hassan II mentioned above, these monarchies were just waiting for the historic opportunity to normalize their relations with the Zionist regime. It is in their interest, the interest of the castes in power. We have seen what could happen to nationalist or progressive Arab regimes (Iraq, Syria, Libya). They were given a choice: fall in line and collaborate with Israel or some “Daesh” or separatist movements will drop on them. These monarchs do not have the suicidal instinct for a Palestine that has become an increasingly evanescent myth.

What is your opinion about the infamous blockade that the Palestinian people are suffering in Gaza while the world is in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic?

The Zionist regime is submitting the people of Gaza to a concentration camp quasi-regime. Why quasi? Because the Zionist conqueror remains just below, cynically and intelligently, the level that could no longer leave the world indifferent. The blockade is not hermetic, allowing to pass through it in dribs and drabs at the occupant’s discretion, just enough to not sink. The fishing area is reduced or increased so as to keep this sword of Damocles on any fisherman who dares to go out. Electricity is limited to a few hours a day. Information from the inside is reduced, travels are limited. Israel even took the liberty about two years ago of banning European parliamentarians from entering the Gaza Strip. All the more so as Egypt’s complicity makes it possible to maintain this situation, and the Palestinian Authority withhold all payments to officials in Gaza. The world is given the impression that the Gazans are struggling, indeed, but that they had something to do with it, because they launch a few rockets from time to time and Hamas is considered a “terrorist” organization. The Zionists have become masters in the art of propaganda, with the complicity of Western governments. And Gaza is paying a terrible price.

You have been threatened and attacked on several occasions, including by the LDJ (Jewish Defense League), for supporting the cause of the Palestinian people and for being anti-Zionist. How do you explain the fact that in France, a country that prides itself on being a State governed by the rule of law and which is a champion of human rights and freedom of speech, fascist militias like Betar (note: radical Zionist Jewish youth movement), LDJ, CRIF, which defend the interests of Israel can act with impunity?

First there is the history of the Second World War and the Vichy regime, which leaves a sense of guilt, a feeling cleverly exploited by the Judeo-Zionist lobby with the multiplication of films on the Shoah which are shown over and over again on French channels.

Then there is the action of the “sayanim” very presents in the media and other institutions, and who terrorize, the word is not too strong, all those who deviate even a little. Take Dieudonné (note: French humorist, actor and political activist), he has been made the devil to such an extent that he can be assassinated with impunity. On the other hand, saying two or three wrong words to Eric Zemmour (note: French political journalist, writer, essayist and polemicist) in the street, and the President of the Republic calls him on the phone for 40 minutes.

Finally, there is great cowardice on the part of French intellectuals, journalists and politicians who do not say what they think. The fear of the CRIF is paralyzing them. Remember Etienne Chouard, a very famous intellectual who became well known during the referendum on Europe in 2005 and for his support for Yellow Vests. He was summoned to explain himself about the gas chambers on the site “Le Média“. The unfortunate man tried to clear out. He’s been bombarded with insults. He went to apologize on “Sud Radio“. He has since lost all credibility.

How do you explain the fact that all the media remain silent about the crimes of the Zionist entity of Israel and do not give voice to people like you? Where is the freedom of speech those western countries brag about? In your opinion, doesn’t the mass media serve an oligarchy?

Modern media are not supposed to track down the truth and proclaim it. See the way they treated covid19 and big-pharma. See also the coverage of Presidents Trump and Putin by these media, or the Syrian case. The major media belong either to the State (public radio and television) or to the financial oligarchies, all of which are, as I have shown, close to the interests of the Zionist lobby. So, when they boast about being free and promoting freedom of speech, they’re just self-promotion by brazenly lying. Moreover, the tendency in the name of this “freedom to inform” is to track down the so-called fake news, in fact the information that don’t fit the mould. And as long as this balance of power lasts, the crimes of the Zionist entity will be silenced or diminished, and the rights of the Palestinian people will be ignored.

In your opinion, weren’t the Oslo Accords a big scam that harmed the Palestinians by depriving them of their rights?

The Oslo Accords were one of the finest diplomatic scams of the century. With the Palestinians’ consent. In a SM (sadomasochistic) relationship, the master and the slave freely assume their role. The Zionist master found in Arafat the ideal slave to play the role.

I say this with great sadness and rage. But the reality is there. Arafat disappeared from the international scene in 1992. When Rabin beckons him, he no longer holds back. He was about to come back into the limelight.

It’s Rabbi’s stroke of genius. Israel was in a very difficult, let’s say catastrophic situation. The Intifada showed an over-armed and brutal army of occupation in the face of stone-throwing kids. The Palestinian cause was at the top. If Rabin had contacted Barghouti, the leader of the Intifada, the latter would have had strict and inflexible demands: Independence or nothing.

Arafat has given up everything. On all the sensitive issues, the refugees, Jerusalem, the settlements, the borders, the independent State, Rabin told him: “we will see later”. And Arafat agreed.

And furthermore, he delivered 60 % of the West Bank under the total sovereignty of Israel. This is the Zone C, on which the major cities of occupation are built.

Ultimately, Arafat could have realized after 2 or 3 years that he had been manipulated, that the Zionists will never give him a State, and slam the door, and put the occupier back in front of his responsibilities. But no, he continued until his death and Mahmoud Abbas is continuing along the same path, which lead to the progressive strangulation of what remained of Palestine.

But for Rabin, and the Zionist regime, the gain was fantastic. Israel was no longer the occupant. The whole world was pretending to proclaim the need for 2 States. It was just a matter of being patient and negotiating. The Zionist regime has thus restored much of its international credibility and legitimacy.

We saw the United States and the whole world shocked by the way George Floyd was murdered by a police officer. However, Palestinians suffer the same abuses on a daily basis, as this hold (a technique known as strangulation) is often used by the Israeli army, Tsahal. How do you explain the fact that nobody protests this? The world was rightly moved by the murder of George Floyd, why does it not react when Palestinians are murdered?

We keep coming back to the same problem. It is the media that make the news. And who controls the media? The Palestinians do not have a voice for the reasons mentioned above. Because when the media decides to inflate a problem, they do.

Who is Jacob Cohen?

Jacob Cohen is a writer and lecturer born in 1944. Polyglot and traveler, anti-Zionist activist, he was a translator and teacher at the Faculty of Law in Casablanca. He obtained a law degree from the Faculty of Casablanca and then joined Science-Po in Paris where he obtained his degree in Science-Po as well as a postgraduate degree (DES) in public law. He lived in Montreal and then Berlin. In 1978, he returned to Morocco where he became an assistant lecturer at the Faculty of Law in Casablanca until 1987. He then moved to Paris where he now focuses on writing. He has published several books, including « Le commando de Hébron » (2014), « Dieu ne repasse pas à Bethléem » (2013), « Le printemps des Sayanim » (2010), « L’espionne et le journaliste » (2008), « Moi, Latifa S. » (2002).

He has a blog and performs on YouTube where he discusses various topics.

Mohsen Abdelmoumen is an independent Algerian journalist. He has written for several Algerian newspapers such as Alger Républicain and in different sites of the alternative press.

June 12, 2020 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

AfD Lawmaker: Anti-Nord Stream 2 Sanctions Are Form of Economic Imperialism by US Fracking Industry

Sputnik – 08.06.2020

Washington’s desire to levy further sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline constitutes a form of economic imperialism designed to support the US fracking industry, Heiko Hessenkemper, a member of the Bundestag Committee on Economic Affairs and Energy from the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, said.

“So the political pressure is understandable, because America, the American economy, and the American financial industry, are up to their necks in the fracking industry … They use illegal transnational sanctions to protect their interests. In summary, this is nothing more than economic imperialism,” Hessenkemper stated.

The Nord Stream 2 pipeline will be vital to ensure Europe’s energy security, the lawmaker said, citing the Dutch government’s decision to wind down the country’s production of natural gas and Germany’s plans to close down many coal and nuclear power plants.

Consequently, Washington’s decision to levy sanctions on the pipeline is both illegal and threatens the energy security of the entire European continent, Hessenkemper added.

“The American argument that Europe is too dependent on Russia and is open to blackmail is, of course, nonsensical because there are enough liquefied gas terminals in Europe that could be refilled from global sources in the event of a supply shortfall. From all these points of view, America’s sanctions are not only illegal, but they are also not in Europe’s interest,” the lawmaker stated.

According to Hessenkemper, the US fracking industry, which is capital-intensive and has high production costs, has been severely impacted by the global fall in oil and gas demand during the ongoing coronavirus disease outbreak. These factors have forced Washington to look abroad and impose sanctions on the fracking industry’s competitors, the lawmaker stated.

US senators on Thursday introduced a bill that would extend the scope of sanctions levied against Nord Stream 2 to include all companies that provide certification, insurance, and port facilities for pipe-laying vessels that are working on the project.

Swiss pipelaying firm Allseas quit the project in December as a result of US sanctions.

The German government has opposed all extraterritorial sanctions imposed by Washington on the pipeline.

See also:

Berlin May Retaliate to Sanctions Against Nord Stream 2 With Duties on US Gas, Senior Lawmaker Warns

June 8, 2020 Posted by | Economics | , | Leave a comment

Does Germany blame Russia for cyberattacks to appease Washington?

By Paul Antonopoulos | June 5, 2020

Berlin is insistent on maintaining problematic relations with Moscow by making claims against Russia. Long-time German Chancellor Angela Merkel accused Russia in the Bundestag that she was the target of Russian hackers, adding that she had concrete proof of the “outrageous” spying attempts, without actually providing any evidence. She even went on to suggest that sanctions could be placed against Russia.

The German Foreign Ministry said in a statement on May 28 that “The Russian ambassador was informed that on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by the federal prosecutor’s office on May 5 against Russian national Dmitry Badin, that the German government will seek in Brussels to use the EU cyber sanctions regime against those responsible for the attack on the German Bundestag, including Mr Badin.”

The alleged cyberattack occurred in 2015 and brings to question why Berlin is now resurrecting a 5-year-old issue that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov highlighted there was no evidence for Russian involvement. EU High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, shared Lavrov’s sentiment and said he also did not have data on a cyberattack on the Bundestag and could not comment on this issue despite Berlin’s threat that it will use the EU to place sanctions on Russia.

“As for Russian hacker attacks, I don’t have any information that I can provide you at this stage,” said Borrel, answering a question from journalists about the possible imposition of sanctions on this case against Russians.

Perhaps as the U.S. continues to threaten companies involved in NordStream 2, Berlin is giving the appearance that it is still anti-Russia, despite being almost entirely reliant on Russia for its energy needs. Also, as Berlin has not provided evidence that Russia was behind the cyberattacks, why has it also not considered the U.S. could have orchestrated the attack?

In October 2013, Steffen Seibert, an official spokesman for the German government, reported that former CIA officer Edward Snowden had warned Germany that U.S. intelligence agencies could track Merkel’s mobile phone. Despite numerous demands from the public to conduct a full investigation and prosecute those responsible for this incident, in June 2015 the German Federal Prosecutor’s Office announced that the case was closed due to the inability to prove it in court.

Although the case allegedly could not be prosecuted, it does call to question why Merkel through a spokesperson told U.S. officials that they “view such practices [like spying] … as completely unacceptable.” White House spokesman Jay Carney said in response that “the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor.”

In a statement, the German government said that “Among close friends and partners, as the Federal Republic of Germany and the U.S. have been for decades, there should be no such monitoring of the communications of a head of government.” The statement also said that Merkel had told Obama that “such practices must be prevented immediately.”

However, this is an incident that took place seven years ago and under a different U.S. administration and political party. None-the-less, in February 2019, a scandal erupted around Swiss company Crypto AG which was developing equipment used to encrypt sensitive information, and was working closely with the CIA and the BND (German intelligence). It was revealed that for more than half a century this practise was going on, demonstrating that U.S. spying on its own allies is not a new phenomenon.

Investigators from the German television station ZDF and The Washington Post found that the illegal actions by U.S. and German intelligence services affected more than 120 countries. The Swiss company supplied products as far back as the Second World War with encryption weaknesses so U.S. and German intelligence agencies could spy on many countries, including their own allies. Though the BND stopped participating in this Rubicon operation, as it came to be known, in 1993, the U.S. continued to spy until 2018.

After such cooperation with the U.S., information about the wiretap of the German Chancellor, which remained without a harsh reaction, is presented in a completely different light. Berlin probably had to quietly take the insult in order to avoid major and public problems because the NATO allies have likely gathered a lot of damaging information about each other over the years in their joint work in the Rubicon operation. It is worth to mention that Germany is not an ordinary European state, but the power engine of the European Union and an important member of NATO.

Now Germany decisively accuses Russia of cyberattacks and threatens sanctions, despite not providing any evidence for their claims. Although Russia, unlike the U.S., did not wiretap the German government, it is much safer to blame Russian citizens for cyberattacks. It does bring into question however why Germany is even possibly discussing sanctions while it fully supports the NordStream 2 pipeline project to secure its energy interests with Russia.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

June 5, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Economics, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Rush to trash hydroxychloroquine exposes fundamental flaws in profit-based medical ‘science’

By Helen Buyniski | RT | June 4, 2020

As the WHO and prestigious medical journal the Lancet back away from questionable data provided by healthcare analytics firm Surgisphere, ulterior motives for the rush to demonize hydroxychloroquine become clear.

The World Health Organization (WHO) sheepishly resumed testing the off-patent malaria drug hydroxychloroquine on coronavirus patients on Wednesday after pausing that arm of its ‘Solidarity’ clinical trial based on data that appeared to show the drug contributed to higher death rates among test subjects. That data, it turned out, came from a tiny US healthcare analytics firm called Surgisphere, and calling it faulty would be excessively charitable.

Not only is Surgisphere a company lacking in medical expertise – its employees included an “adult” entertainer and a science-fiction writer – but its CEO Sapan Desai co-authored two of the damning studies that used the firm’s data to smear hydroxychloroquine, already thoroughly demonized in the media thanks to its promotion by US President Donald Trump, as a killer. All data is sourced to a proprietary database supposedly containing a veritable ocean of real-time, detailed patient information yet curiously absent from existing medical literature.

The Surgisphere-tainted study appeared to show increased risk of in-hospital deaths and heart problems with no disease-fighting benefits, confirming the suspicions of medical-industry naysayers already inclined to hate the off-patent drug due to the lack of profit potential and Trump’s incessant boosterism. Italy, France, and Germany rushed to ban hydroxychloroquine, citing “an increased risk for adverse reactions with little or no benefit.”

But such a shameless character assassination performed against a potentially-lifesaving drug – especially one with a decades-long track record of safety in malaria, lupus, and arthritis patients that came highly recommended by some of the world’s most eminent disease experts, including France’s Didier Raoult – could only be accomplished with help from industry prejudice. It required ignoring numerous existing studies showing hydroxychloroquine was beneficial in treating early-stage Covid-19 patients, as well as anecdotal reports from thousands of doctors who’d successfully used it.

It also required trusting a fly-by-night company with next to no internet or media presence to make decisions that could affect the lives of millions of people. It’s not like there weren’t warning signs Surgisphere was something other than the top-notch medical analytics firm it presented itself as. The company began life as a textbook publisher in 2008 and hired most of its 11 employees two month ago, according to an investigation by the Guardian, yet it claimed ownership of a massive international database of 96,000 patients in 1,200 hospitals worldwide. One expert interviewed by the outlet said it would be difficult for even a national statistics agency to do in years what Surgisphere had supposedly done in weeks, calling the database “almost certainly a scam.” Yet no one at the Lancet or WHO thought to look a gift horse in the mouth – not when that gift drove a stake through the heart of hydroxychloroquine as Covid-19 treatment.

And while Australian researchers found flaws in the Surgisphere data just days after the May 22 publication of the Lancet study, noting that the number of Covid-19 deaths cited by the study as coming from five hospitals exceeded the entirety of Covid-19 deaths recorded in Australia at that time, the Lancet – instead of investigating just who this Surgisphere company really was, and why it had made such a glaring mistake – merely published a minor retraction related to the Australian data and put the controversy to bed.

The full-frontal assault on hydroxychloroquine was instead allowed to continue unchecked in the media, as mainstream outlets focused their energies on fluffing up remdesivir – a costly, untested drug manufactured by drug maker Gilead that has so far produced lackluster results in clinical trials – and stumping for an eventual vaccine. Hydroxychloroquine’s off-patent status meant it was a dead end as far as profits were concerned, while remdesivir and whatever vaccine is ultimately green-lighted will make a lot of people very rich. Perhaps hoping to throw their audiences off the real reason for their hydroxychloroquine hatred, several outlets hinted that Trump stood to make money off the drug (which costs about 60 cents per pill) – but even Snopes, no fan of the ‘Bad Orange Man’, had to pour cold water on that speculation.

The Lancet and New England Journal of Medicine have – belatedly – published “expressions of concern” about the Surgisphere hydroxychloroquine study, and an independent audit is being conducted. But the problem of biased health authorities selectively embracing some trial results while rejecting others is unlikely to stop there.

The Lancet study is hardly the only one to show hydroxychloroquine lacks efficacy in treating Covid-19. Multiple studies conducted by the US National Institutes of Health on hospitalized (i.e. severely-ill) coronavirus patients have yielded poor results, but even the drug’s most ardent evangelists acknowledge it doesn’t help end-stage or very sick patients. Raoult has even claimed France banned the drug’s use in all but the most severely ill patients in order to discredit it as a treatment. The US National Institutes of Health was publishing studies in its journal Virology touting chloroquine as “a potent inhibitor of SARS coronavirus infection” as far back as 2005, yet ‘coronavirus czar’ Anthony Fauci throws shade at the drug whenever he gets a chance.

As long as deadly diseases like Covid-19 are seen as profit sources first and human rights issues second (or third, or tenth…), treatments that aren’t profitable will always be marginalized in favor of costly and frequently less-effective pharmaceuticals. Drug industry profiteering has already killed hundreds of thousands – if not millions – of people in the US alone. Taking the profit motive out of healthcare can help ensure its body count stays as low as possible.

Helen Buyniski is an American journalist and political commentator at RT. Follow her on Twitter @velocirapture23

June 4, 2020 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Economics | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Support for NATO wanes in France, Germany & even US as alliance struggles to maintain unity

RT | February 10, 2020

Public support for NATO has seen a notable decline in France, Germany and the US, according to a new poll. The alliance has suffered from months of budgetary in-fighting and mud-slinging among member states.

While the Pew Research study noted that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization still enjoys general support across member states, it pointed out that several countries “have soured on the alliance.”

Positive views of the transatlantic alliance fell to 52 percent in the United States last year, from 64 percent in 2018, the survey found. In France, support fell to 49 percent, from 60 percent in 2017 and 71 percent in 2009. A figure for 2018 was not available. Germany also saw a drop in public support, which stood at 57 percent in 2019, down from 63 percent in 2018. Positive ratings of NATO among members range from a high of 82 percent in Poland to 21 percent in Turkey.

The decline in public support can be attributed to a number of factors, including months of heated debate over defense spending among member states. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly chastised alliance members for not meeting their military spending commitment of two percent of GDP, while arguing that the United States pays far too much for Europe’s defense.

European states have also been highly critical of the Cold War-era defensive alliance. Last year, French President Emmanuel Macron accused NATO of suffering from “brain death” because of its perceived failure to help maintain global security and resolve world conflicts.

The alliance has also struggled to maintain a united front, most notable in Syria, where Turkey has been at odds with its American allies. Ankara has also locked horns with Athens over the tense military and political situation in Libya.

Founded in 1949 to counter the Soviet Union, NATO has been criticized for being largely obsolete and lacking a clear purpose. Despite billing itself as a defensive alliance, it has participated in a number of disastrous military interventions in the Middle East and North Africa.

February 10, 2020 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Well-Deserved ‘Love’ for US Ambassadors Around the World

By Vladimir Platov – New Eastern Outlook – 10.01.2020

The ambassador of any nation is not just the highest-ranking diplomatic representative of their country in a foreign state or an international organization, not simply a spokesperson of their country’s government and their interests, who is obliged to act in line with their diplomatic status. As a country representative, an ambassador is closely associated with their homeland in the eyes of foreigners. An ambassador’s conduct forms the impression of their country and its citizens, determining their level of prestige.

In recent years, international media outlets have shared countless stories about American ambassadors, who are, unfortunately, not usually praised for their humanitarian deeds. They are rather known for their true aggressive nature, which no diplomatic status can conceal.

Today, a number of circumstances contribute to the growing discontent in many parts of the world not only with Washington’s foreign policy, but with American ambassadors as well. The main reason for this is their blatant disregard for the citizens of the countries where they serve, coupled with their arrogance and unwillingness to take into account international norms of conduct, including those of diplomatic etiquette.

Thus, in South Korea, even among supporters of President Moon Jae-in, the US Ambassador Harry Harris has recently become the object of fierce hatred. As Japanese media say, ever since December 12, 2019 daily rallies against the American ambassador have been held near the US Embassy in Korea, the participants assimilating him to a ‘governor of a Japanese colony.’ Members of left-leaning political parties and civil society organizations who take part in the rallies even go as far as to stage overly extreme ‘contests’ to decapitate a stuffed puppet of the ambassador or burn his image and chant about torturing ‘him with chopsticks.’ According to reporters, Ambassador Harris is obediently pursuing his country’s political course with the straightforwardness typical for a former member of the armed forces. This is most likely the cause of the dislike South Korean political community harbors for him, the Japanese newspaper JB Press writes.

For months now, the German government and population have been openly expressing their disapproval of the actions of US ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell. According to the Spiegel magazine, he has been politically isolated by Germany’s ruling elite since early 2019.

In January 2019, the German news outlet Bild published excerpts from Ambassador Richard Grenell’s notorious letters, in which he openly threatened a number of German companies with sanctions for their participation in the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, demanding that Germany withdraw from the project. This interference into the country’s affairs was considered by the German Foreign Office to be unacceptable. Wolfgang Kubicki, Vice-President of the Bundestag, called on the foreign minister to expel Grenell because of his intervention into ‘the political affairs of sovereign Germany.’

On June 6, Grennell was invited to the German Foreign Office for a lecture behind closed doors on what exactly appropriate conduct entails. His expulsion was once more openly demanded by the Bundestag, in particular, by the leader of the left-wing faction Sahra Wagenknecht. She was outraged by Ambassador Grenell’s public statement of support for conservative forces in Europe, which was perceived as meddling in Germany’s political life.

In August, yet again, Ambassador Grenell found himself at the center of another scandal after relaying and sharing his personal interpretation of yet another ‘anti-German’ statement of the American President.

After Washington had imposed broad sanctions against the gas pipeline Nord Stream 2, Ambassador Grenell had to face another wave of outrage on December, 22 as he declared to German media that these sanctions were allegedly adopted in the interests of Europe and in answer to the Europeans’ requests. Meanwhile, the ambassador completely ignored the German government’s official statement that the new US sanctions against Nord Stream 2 and the Turkish Stream pipelines are an unacceptable intrusion into European affairs.

Even Georgia, which is trying to demonstrate its commitment to the United States, criticized the ambassador of the ‘undemocratic state’ of America. Namely, Georgia’s former State Minister for Conflict Resolution and renowned film director Georgi Khaindrava called on Western politicians to treat his homeland with the utmost respect. He also advised them to deal with problems in their own nations first before railing at the missteps of Georgian democracy. He specifically emphasized that, “The international community must respect any nation, no matter its size. Some embassies here do not defend the interests of the countries they represent in Georgia, for example, the acting US envoy to Georgia, Elizabeth Rood.”

The US was forced to recall their ambassador to Zambia, Daniel Foote, on December, 23 after the southern African nation’s refusal to continue working with him due to his fairly active defense of members of the LGBT community. Zambia’s Foreign Minister Joseph Malanji said these actions amounted to an attack on the country’s constitution and were considered as ‘interference into Zambia’s domestic affairs.’ Earlier, Zambian President Edgar Lungu had declared the country’s citizens would not make concessions on homosexuality even in exchange for humanitarian aid: “If this is the way you wish to help, I’m afraid the West had better leave us in poverty. We’ll struggle and survive just like we used to.”

Criticism of US ambassadors is rife even within the US itself. For one, in an interview with the New York magazine on December 8, Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani criticized the flawed system of political lobbying used for appointing US envoys. He said that, for example, investor George Soros used the services of the FBI to appoint four US ambassadors to Ukraine.

Even these examples show that the decidedly undiplomatic behavior of several US ambassadors forms quite a negative perception of the ‘faces of Washington’. Consequently, considering the much-criticized foreign policy of the United States, this fuels the aversion to the USA itself.

January 10, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

German politician: “Ami go home!”

By Alexandra Kamyshanova | December 26, 2019

In Germany, discontent is growing over unequal relations with the United States Oskar Lafontaine is a German politician, candidate for Chancellor in the German federal election of 1990, Chairman of the Social Democratic Party from 1995 to 1999, Minister of Finance from 1998 to 1999, leader of The Left in Saarland since 2010.

The United States of America is waging bloody economic wars against the entire world, and now against us Germans. The German government is talking interference with our sovereignty. What a fallacy! We have never been a sovereign state. After the end of the World War II, it is the Americans who have been handling issues of war and peace in Germany.

In 1963, Charles de Gaulle said: “Having allies… is a matter of course for us in the historical era in which we find ourselves. But to have your own free choice… is also a categorical imperative, because alliances have no absolute virtue, no matter what feelings they are based on. And if you give up control over yourself, you run the risk of never regaining it.”

Later, Francois Mitterrand would add: “You can’t hand the solution over to others when life or death is at stake.”

American military bases in Germany imperil us instead of protecting. The United States is pushing us to a war with its aggressive policy of encircling Russia and China, with allocating huge amounts of $738 billion for military purposes, by means of withdrawing from the INF Treaty and placing short-range missiles next to the Russian borders. It is in our interest to liberate the German soil from US military bases.

“Ami go home!” the students chanted in 1968, when the United States killed millions of people in Vietnam, using its military bases in Germany. “Ami go home!” the Germans urged when the United States, under the guise of lying about Saddam Hussein’s possession of weapons of mass destruction, unleashed the war in Iraq using its military facilities in Germany – a war that claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. “Ami go home!” – this appeal should become the motto of German politics today, when the greatest military power in the world is obviously violating international law and terrorizing all of the world.

This has been taken from Oscar Lafontaine’s Facebook and distributed by the German Nachdenk Seiten run by another “heavyweight” of German politics – Albrecht Müller, a long-term ally of German Chancellor Willy Brandt, Bundestag member from 1987 to 1994.

“People like Oscar Lafontaine,” Albrecht Müller writes in his commentary, “able to get across their ideas, are a must-have in politics. The demand [on the US to leave Germany] is by no means radical. It’s appropriate. Many Germans believe so, but not those who shape today’s politics in Berlin. The German establishment and representatives of the major news outlets are either associated with the United States and dependent on them, or serve the interests of the military establishment. There are also people who simply lack courage and consider the ‘Ami go home’ demand unduly radical. What else should happen? Sanctions have been imposed against us Germans. The weaponization process is at our expense. We are involved in maneuvers next to the Russian borders. Convoys with military equipment block our railways. What is finally going to make the cup run over.”

December 26, 2019 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

Trump-Bidens-Russia-Ukraine: A systemic interpretation

To understand the Trump-Bidens-Russia-Ukraine fiasco clearly, we have to park the moral, constitutional and legal issues

By Padraig McGrath | December 25, 2019

On December 23rd, the Washington Post ran a piece exploring the possible motivations behind US president Donald Trump’s decision to pause US military aid to Ukraine on July 12th last year. On September 28th 2018 and February 16th respectively, President Trump had signed into law two bills from Congress which approved a combined $391 million in military aid to Ukraine, including the provision of lethal weaponry.

The question is extensively explored in the Washington Post article, as in other articles on the issue, as to whether or not Trump’s July 12th decision to withhold the military aid violated the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, which states that once Congress appropriates funds and the president signs the relevant spending bill, then it is not within the president’s legal power to withhold those funds.

The Washington Post and other media have also tentatively explored the unresolved question as to what connection, if any, Trump’s July 12th decision to withhold the funds might have had to his subsequent July 25th telephone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodydmyr Zelensky, which became central to arguments for his impeachment. Was Trump using the withholding of aid in order to pressure Zelensky into launching investigations into Hunter Biden’s Ukrainian business-interests, and those of other senior figures in the US Democratic Party? To be fair, the Washington Post article, and a surprisingly high proportion of the other media-coverage of these questions, have been soberly analytical. Refreshingly, the coverage has managed to avoid the worst excesses of liberal Trump Derangement Syndrome.

I believe that the legal debate is largely incidental to what is really happening, and that any moral debate on this issue is even more superfluous than the legal debate. However, before we set the complex legal issues aside, it should be briefly stated that they are not unimportant. Even if we understand that 99% of everybody’s motivations for getting entangled in the legal debate are politically partisan, it is at least conceivable that a person might wish to ask these questions from a non-partisan, purely legal point of view, and that purely juridical concern should not be dismissed out of hand. Regarding the Bidens’ role in this fiasco, one surprising aspect is that it took so many years for the controversy regarding Burisma Holdings to go viral, even in alt-media. The facts that not only Hunter Biden but also Devon Archer, a former John Kerry campaign manager, sat on Burisma’s board of directors, and that Burisma was extensively invested in shale-gas extraction in the vicinity of the Donbas war-zone, had been public knowledge in the Russian-speaking world ever since 2014.

However, in order to understand what is really happening at the deeper systemic level, we need to also set the endless cycle of allegations and counter-allegations aside. The petty political or financial agendas of the Bidens, or Trump, or this or that member of Congress, are incidental to the big systemic picture. Sure, all the players have their own self-interested petty motivations, but the sum of all those motivations does not amount to an explanation of why the game is being played in the first place. Politicians, and occasionally their wastrel offspring, are merely unwitting instruments of history, not agents of history. The parameters of the game are determined by a core geo-strategic logic. What vital geo-strategic interest does the United States have in Ukraine?

Back in 2014, there was certainly hope in US business circles that Ukraine could be a profitable colony, and some US companies including Monsanto have profited from their expansion into Ukraine. However, for most US commercial interests, it quickly became clear in the immediate post-coup period that Ukraine was simply too much of a self-destructive black hole to hope that it might ever become a profitable colony. Ukraine’s culture of blatant kleptocracy was simply too pervasive and ingrained for most western concerns’ money to be safe there.

So rather than the economic exploitation of Ukraine, the United States’ vital geo-strategic interest in Ukraine centrally stems from the point that the maintenance of permanent instability in Ukraine presents developmental and security-challenges to Russia. Furthermore, the maintenance of perpetual Ukrainian hostility toward Russia is useful to larger US geo-strategic interests. We need to remember Zbigniew Brzezinski’s 1997 statement that “without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire.” Brzezinski had identified 3 “geo-strategic pivots” on the Eurasian land-mass which were vital to the task of protecting broader and more global US interests – Iran, Turkey and Ukraine. We have to admit that, as badly as the US foreign policy establishment miscalculated in Ukraine, they still got a piece of what they wanted. The loss of Ukraine’s potential membership was a major blow to the Eurasian Customs Union’s potential for economic reach.

Furthermore, Ukraine’s geography renders it a perfect instrument to drive an economic wedge between Germany and Russia. The trajectory of Russian-German economic integration which has developed steadily over the past 20 years was unquestionably contrary to the decaying hegemon’s interest. Ever since the late 19th century, American geo-strategists have morbidly feared the economic synthesis of Germany’s technological resources with Russia’s human resources and natural resources.

In this regard, all of the legal allegations and counter-allegations regarding Trump and the Bidens are merely incidental noise, and the attached moral arguments are even more absurd.

Here’s what’s really happening:

Trump’s role as a political outsider in Washington is, in this context, manifested in the point that he still thinks like a businessman, not like a geo-strategic planner. As Ukraine is simply too dysfunctional to be turned into a profitable US colony, Trump simply has no meaningful interest in Ukraine. Trump has most probably never bothered reading Halford Mackinder or George Kennan. His critics and political enemies will argue that, as a mere businessman, Trump doesn’t understand that the game is not about “Ukraine” – the game is about Eurasia.

December 25, 2019 Posted by | Corruption, Economics, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

German Parliament Greenlights Non-Binding Initiative to Ban Hezbollah

Sputnik – December 20, 2019

German lawmakers approved a non-binding initiative on Thursday calling on the government to ban from Germany the political and militant group Hezbollah, which forms part of the Lebanese government. The move, reportedly aimed at combating anti-Semitism, has been rejected multiple times by the parliament.

The Thursday resolution was approved by the opposition Free Democrats as well as the Social Democratic Party, which is allied to the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party. The move seeks to ban the political arm of Hezbollah from Germany and to add the group to the European Union’s terrorist list.

“It is unacceptable that Hezbollah is waging a terrorist fight against Israel in the Middle East, which is being financed through worldwide criminal activities, among other things,” CDU spokesperson Mathias Middelberg said in a statement, according to AP. “In view of Germany’s special responsibility toward Israel, we call on the government to ban all activities for Hezbollah in Germany.”“The separation between a political and a military arm should be abandoned, and Hezbollah as a whole should be placed on the EU terrorist list,” Middelberg said. “This could freeze Hezbollah’s funds and assets in Europe more extensively than before.”

Germany last weighed the question of banning the political wing of Hezbollah, which has just over 1,000 members, in June. That bill, sponsored by the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has repeatedly sponsored bills seeking to ban burqas and minarets, claiming “Islam is not a part of Germany,” according to Middle East Monitor, failed amid joint opposition by the same parties that sponsored the resolution passed Thursday.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz praised the move, calling it “an important step in the international struggle against terrorism, particularly against terrorist organization Hezbollah and its patron Iran,” AP noted. US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell also voiced his support.Hezbollah is a Lebanese political party and militant group whose primary basis of support is the country’s Shiite Muslim community, although it also enjoys the support of many Christians, Druze and even Sunni Muslims. It gained notoriety for fighting the Israel Defense Forces to a standstill in Lebanon’s south when Israel invaded in 2006. The group was formed as a self-defense force in the early 1980s, during a previous occupation by Israeli forces, against whom it waged a guerrilla campaign. It has also joined the fight in Syria against Daesh and other jihadist rebel groups.

Hezbollah has been accused of multiple acts of terrorism, such as a bus bombing in the Bulgarian city of Burgas in 2012 that killed seven people and injured 32, although no conclusive evidence tying Hezbollah to the attack has been found. It’s also been accused of being behind a slew of terrorist attacks in the early 1980s, including several deadly bombings in Beirut, but again with limited evidence behind the claims. However, 14 nations and several international organizations have declared Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization, while eight nations have declared it not to be one. Hezbollah is also accused of being a proxy of Iran.

Mustafa Ammar, a CDU candidate for the 2021 elections, told Asharq Al-Awsat late last month that secret talks had taken place during a congress held by the CDU in Leipzig about how best to limit anti-Semitism in Germany, especially in schools.“One of the measures included the total banning of Hezbollah and its activities,” Ammar told the London-based outlet. A Hamburg intelligence agency reported in July that Hezbollah had ties to about 30 mosques across Germany, where it raises funds and spreads its ideology, according to Fox News.

Hezbollah has long maintained it distinguishes between Judaism as a religion and Zionism as a political ideology, with leader Hassan Nasrallah saying in 2009: “Our problem with [the Israelis] is not that they are Jews, but that they are occupiers who are raping our land and holy places.” However, Nassrallah and other Hezbollah leaders have also been accused of anti-Semitic statements.

Last week, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order that categorized anti-Israeli speech as anti-Semitism and hate speech under Article VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The move is widely interpreted as aimed at punishing anti-Israel initiatives like Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) by declaring them to be anti-Semitic, tying the nation of Israel to the worldwide Jewish community.

December 20, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Islamophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Contrast Of Climate And Energy Policies, And Economic Results, In The U.S. And Germany

By Francis Menton – Manhattan Contrarian – December 6, 2019

If you are reading your normal diet of “mainstream” press, you are getting hit with a constant barrage of climate alarm, together with a near total boycott on any good economic news for as long as Trump remains President. As a result, it is very easy to lose track of the widening chasm in the climate and energy policies, and also in the economic results, between the U.S. and its major European competitors. When you put some easily-available numbers together in one place, the contrast becomes very striking. For today, I will collect a smattering of relevant statistics, focusing on the U.S. and Germany.

And then there are the positions on these subjects of the candidates for the Democratic nomination for President. I find those positions beyond belief.

You probably know that the so-called “fracking” revolution in oil and gas production has led to a large increase in U.S. production of those fuels over the last ten or so years. The actual numbers are quite remarkable. On the oil side, according to data from the government’s Energy Information Agency, in 2008 U.S. production of crude oil from all sources averaged 5 million barrels per day. By 2018, that figure had well more than doubled to 10.99 million bbl/dy. By contrast, crude oil production in Saudi Arabia in 2018 was 10.445 million bbl/dy (up from 9.261 bbl/dy in 2008), and in Russia was 10.759 bbl/dy (up from 9.357 bbl/dy in 2008). Of today’s U.S. production, some 59% — representing essentially all of the increase since 2008 — comes from so-called “tight” resources, meaning those that are produced by fracking.

The large increase in U.S. production has been accompanied by a correspondingly large decline in the price of oil and natural gas. Oil of the WTI (West Texas Intermediate) grade that traded at $110 per barrel in 2013 closed today at $59.12. U.S. prices for a gallon of regular grade gasoline, which reached a high of $3.90 in 2012, fell as low as $2.25 earlier this year, and are currently around $2.60. Natural gas prices are quite volatile, but were in the range of $4 to $6 per thousand cubic feet in 2014, and most recently $2.29.

In September, the U.S. became a net exporter of oil for the first time since the 1940s. The EIA expects that status to continue for the foreseeable future.

Over in the economic news category, the U.S. continues to thrive. Today, the Labor Department reported an increase in jobs of 266,000 during November, the unemployment rate down to 3.5% (lowest since 1969), and wages up 3.1% over a year ago. All of those must be considered excellent results.

And then there’s Germany. According to CleanEnergyWire, Germany in 2018 imported 98% of its oil needs, and 95% of its gas. But doesn’t Germany have at least one good shale formation that could be developed? The answer is that Germany pretty much banned all fracking in 2017. They are still caught up in the Energiewende, or, in other words, the delusional idea that wind and solar power can replace fossil fuels within a few years. Nearly ten years into this, their carbon emissions have barely decreased at all, while emissions increases in places like China and India make any marginal decreases that Germany can achieve completely irrelevant. Meanwhile, they depend for their oil and natural gas on places like Russia and the Middle East.

GlobalPetrolPrices gives the most recent price of consumer gasoline in Germany as 1.385 euros per liter, equivalent to $5.807 per gallon. Admittedly, this cannot be blamed solely on supply restrictions; embedded taxes are also substantially at fault. But those embedded taxes are also part of the ongoing war against fossil fuels. German consumer electricity prices are also about triple the U.S. average.

And the economic news from Germany? It seems that the industrial sector is in the midst of a slump, in substantial part caused by the mad drive to force energy conversion without consideration of the costs. From the Daily Express, December 3:

THE GERMAN car industry is facing disaster with up to 50,000 jobs under threat or expected to be lost before the end of the year in what has been described as the “biggest crisis since the invention of the automobile”. Last week the owner of Mercedes-Benz announced plans to axe at least 10,000 employees globally, taking the number of jobs losses by German carmakers to almost 40,000 this year as the industry sinks under a massive sales slump. Daimler wants to save £1.2billion in staff costs as it prepares to invest billions in the electric cars boom. Audi, which is owned by Volkswagen, has also said it would be shedding almost 10,000 people – around around 10 percent of its global workforce.

Trading Economics states that German GDP “rebounded” to a growth of 0.1% in the third quarter, after a decline of 0.2% in the second quarter of 2019. Congratulations!

Meanwhile, among the Democratic candidates for President, the contest is between those who would ban fracking immediately, and those who advocate some period of “transition” to some fanciful alternative. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have vowed to ban fracking immediately. It’s not clear how they would do that, other than that they view the presidency in their hands as a dictatorship of unlimited powers. Then there’s the “moderate” Joe Biden, who said (yesterday) “I’d love to make sure we can’t use any oil or gas, period,” but then hedged that we would need some period to “transition away” from those fuels.

“Transitioning” away from fossil fuels — that’s what Germany is doing.

December 7, 2019 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

‘Expulsion of Russian diplomats over Berlin murder case suits trend of blaming Moscow for everything, whether it’s true or not’

RT | December 5, 2019

Germany seems to be joining the cohort of those playing the old-time blame-Russia game, having expelled two diplomats citing Moscow’s unwillingness to help probe a murder of a suspected terrorist on its soil.

On a sunny day in August, Zelimkhan Khangoshvili – formerly a Chechen militant suspected of terrorist activity in Russia and a Georgian national – set off for his last walk through the Kleiner Tiergarten park located in one of Berlin’s central boroughs. Not long after that, he was shot dead in broad daylight by an assassin who allegedly used a silenced pistol to do the job.

The high-profile murder case returned to the spotlight when Berlin made a bold move expelling two Russian diplomats.

The official rationale was that “we’ve not seen that Russia backs us in inquiring into the murder,” as Chancellor Angela Merkel mildly put it. Germany’s Foreign Office, on their part, echoed Merkel’s points but stated that “serious and immediate participation by the Russian authorities is still required.”

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow was surprised by Berlin’s accusations, telling the press he couldn’t comprehend what led Germany to believe Russia was involved in the killing.

“We have communications channels set up for our law enforcement agencies … these should be used. If our German partners claim that Russia doesn’t cooperate enough, I don’t know what that assessment is based upon.”

The Prosecutor General’s Office that took over the probe claimed of having “sufficient factual evidence that the killing may have been ordered by state authorities of the Russian Federation or the autonomous Republic of Chechnya which is a part of Russia.” They have not revealed any details.

Berlin was “absolutely reluctant” to deteriorate its relationships with Russia which “are not in as good shape as they ought to be,” according to political analyst Dr. Werner Patzelt. Thus, he believes expelling the diplomats “was something like a final resort” to make Moscow co-operate.

But the fact that no evidence was presented made some German politicians very uneasy.

“That the federal government singles out two Russian diplomats, although the investigation is still going on, is difficult to understand without having clear information,” said Alexander Lambsdorff, vice-president of the Free Democrats’ (FDP) parliamentary group.

The media immediately started making comparisons with the Skripal poisoning saga over the Russian connection. There’s one similarity with the British case – there was no evidence presented to the public, but the blaming started immediately.

For years, there has been a “tendency to blame Russia for this and that, beginning with the putsch in Kiev, and the MH17 crash in Ukraine, the Skripal case and now this,” Willy Wimmer, former Vice President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, told RT.

Western Europeans are concerned “that everything is used to blame Russia whether it’s true or not,” he argued. The German authorities who expelled the Russian diplomats, “have to say more,” Wimmer urged, adding, “they have to explain why they did it and if there is really enough evidence to create problems for our diplomatic relations.”

Germany has been under pressure the US and some other Western allies over its business relations with Russia, in particular the construction of the Nord Stream pipeline that Washington pledged to sanction.

December 5, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Russophobia | | Leave a comment