Sic Semper Tyrannis

More on the Yemeni triumph.

(These are ours now ...)

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/09/30/three-saudi-brigades-annihilated-in-devastating-houthi-offensive-in-saudi-arabia/

pl

Salmon filet on the grill tonight.

 

From a supermarket.  Marinated it for a couple of hours in:  olive oil, soy, citrus soy, teriyaki sauce, salt, pepper, mustard powder, ginger powder, garlic powder, red wine.

Cooked on the grill flesh side down, then skin side down, flesh side up until it reached 140 Fahrenheit in the thick end.  Basted with the marinade.

A delicious medium well (how we like it) nice and juicy.  Even the skin was delicious and infused with the marinade.    pl

"Nasr min Allah! Nasr min Allah!" (a victory from God Almighty) Somebody show this to Trump!

One of our correspondents was kind enough to send me this link.  We should all watch it.  It has a quality much like "The Battle of San Pietro,"  a film from the Italian Campaign in WW2.

It depicts a running battle through the mountains along the excellent road from Najran City as the Saudi and and allied Yemeni forces (referred to as traitors in the film) flee to the east trying to escape the giant, well laid ambush that was set as a trap by the Houthis and the Salih loyalist part of the Yemeni Army.

Evidently the senior Saudi commanders mostly deserted their men and fled early and swiftly.  As a result the Saudi forces surrendered en masse, abandoning armored vehicles and civilian type trucks stuffed full of weapons, supplies and ammunition.  Many of the vehicles, including armored vehicles are in running condition and in the film one can see Yemeni soldiers mount the vehicles and drive them off  Among these vehicles are fully tracked M-113 US made APCs that are carriers for radar trained air defense Gatling guns,   These will be very useful in the future.

Some of the vehicles are marked in Arabic as belonging to the Saudi National Guard (SANG) and from their condition I suppose that these troops were from the Modernized SANG that the US has worked hard to train and equip for fifty years or more.  The easy surrender of these beduins is very bad news for the Saudi monarchy.

The many, many prisoners seem to be humanely treated.  There are Houthi medical personnel on the scene treating enemy wounded.  If I were the Rebel commander I would truck all these prisoners down to Sanaa and invited the International Red Cross and UN in to register them and start a stream of food, water and shelter supplies coming in to care for all these men.

Someone please show President Trump this film.  It makes the lies of creatures like Pompeo obvious.

https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2019/09/29/607432/Yemeni-Army-release-footage-of-Victory-from-God-Almighty-offensive-against-Najran

Crossing the Line by Fred

Great and terrible things can happen when  you cross a line. Sometimes it fills you with dread, like it did with Scott, but other times it's just a bunch of fuss and feathers. Both of which might occur in this hear, to use the new expresion of the new millenium, "conversation". Now you might be a wonder'n about how this idea got started, well listen to me now and believe me later when I tell you it happend as a result of listen'n to a planetary climate change expert, one that done dropped out o high school to boot. Can't get much more expert than that, let me tell ya. Now not to worry, this hear tale won't take much o' ya tweleve years. You'll still have plenty of time to send out a planetary SOS (Save Obama's Sand). But that's in the future. So lets all us all get ah started.

[Yemeni] Armed Forces spokesman: Saudi Brigades Destroyed, Scores of Mercs Captured in Najran Offensive - TTG

Many of you have already passed the word of the Yemeni defeat of three Saudi brigades. Here is the description of this victory from the English edition of the Yemeni Almasirah Media Network.

————

News - Yemen 

The spokesman for Yemeni Armed Forces says three Saudi military brigades were completely destroyed after Yemeni Army troops, backed by allied fighters from Popular Committees, mounted a large-scale military offensive in the kingdom’s southern border region of Najran. 

Speaking at a press conference in the capital Sana’a on Saturday evening, Brigadier General Yahya Saree described the major and efficient operation, dubbed Victory from Allah, as the biggest-ever since Saudi Arabia and some of its allies embarked an atrocious military campaign on Yemen more than four years ago, noting that the offensive lasted several months and inflicted dramatic losses – both in terms of military hardware and personnel – upon the enemy, the media bureau of Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah movement said in a statement.

“The operation resulted in the complete destruction of three military brigades of the enemy (Saudi) forces, seizure of large quantities of military equipment, including hundreds of vehicles and armored vehicles, capture of thousands of enemy forces, mostly traitors and the beguiled (Saudi sponsored Yemeni militiamen loyal to Yemen's former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi). Hundreds more were killed and wounded in the process as well,” Saree pointed out.  (Almasirah English)

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The Arabic language version of Almashirah had a few more details. I got these details only through Google Translate. This was another well planned operation aimed to lure the Saudis into a trap before annihilating them within 72 hours of the commencement of the operation. In other words, the Saudi forces were not only out-fought by the plucky little hill people, but they were out-witted, out-planned and out-campaigned by the Houthis. The Houthis employed “specialized” units of the Yemeni Army including “rocket power and air force marching and defense Aerial” [Google translate results]. I'm sure Colonel Lang or another Arabic speaker here can give a better translation.

The Houthi forces had to protect their prisoners from ensuing Saudi airstrikes. I suspect the captured Yemeni militiamen loyal to Yemen's former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and other mercenary prisoners will no longer be supporting the Saudi Royals after being targeted by the Saudi Air Force. Many may decide to come over to the Houthi side rather than remain POWs.

This same Yemeni Army brigadier general speaking today mentioned Yemeni Armed Forces possessed enough drones, rockets and cruise missiles to last two years when he introduced these weapons several months ago. Between this fact and today’s Houthi ground victory, it is no surprise the Saudis are accepting the ceasefire. 

Spin that, you miserable royal bastards! 

Almashirah said there will be a more in depth briefing on Operation Victory from Allah tomorrow. 

TTG

http://english.almasirah.net/details.php?es_id=9020&cat_id=1

(The Arabic language version)

https://almasirah.net/details.php?es_id=45411&cat_id=3

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/houthi-forces-capture-saudi-army-officers-in-big-attack-along-yemeni-border/

Saudi Arabia accepts cease fire in Yemen

"Saudi Arabia has agreed to a limited cease-fire in several areas of Yemen including the capital Sana’a, which is controlled by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, as part of broader efforts to end a four-year conflict that has threatened to escalate into regional war.

A Yemeni government official and a diplomat said attempts were underway to expand the truce. Saudi officials couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Last week, the Houthis announced a unilateral halt to the hundreds of drone and missile attacks that have targeted OPEC’s largest producer in recent years.

The apparent breakthroughs follow a devastating attack on major Saudi oil facilities that briefly halved the country’s output and rattled global markets this month. Yemen’s Houthis said they carried out the attack using a swarm of unmanned aircraft, but the U.S. has said Iran was responsible."  yahoo, Bloomberg, etc.

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This doesn't fit the US government BS narrative in which it was IRAN who attacked at Abqaiq and Khareus.  Pompeo scoffed the other day at the idea that the Yemeni rebels could have done the deed, but here we have the obvious truth.

Saudi Arabia would not have negotiated a cease fire with the Yemeni rebels if it had not been the Yemenis who attacked them.  They know that if there is not a cease fire there will be more attacks against their petroleum infrastructure and possibly their desal plants without which they cannot survive.

Remember this the next time Pompeo tells you anything.  He evidently forgot the word "honor" in the West Point motto.  pl

https://www.yahoo.com/news/saudi-arabia-agrees-limited-cease-134703209.html

Decameron: Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and King Belshaz’ar

The writing on the wall said "Mene Mene Tekel."  Unable to read it, King Belshaz'zar summoned Daniel who interpreted the words:  “God hath numbered thy kingdom and finished it. Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.”

Historian Mark Perry tells us in his recent article, "The Military Officials Who Knew Saudi Arabia Would Fail," in the American Conservative:

"While it seems axiomatic that most Americans suffer from historical amnesia, that’s not necessarily true for the U.S. military. And as America and Iran were sprinting towards a military confrontation last week, a recently retired senior U.S. military officer expounded on what he called `the bumbling, incompetent and feckless stupidity of it all.'

"The target of the officer’s ire was not Donald Trump (whom he admires) or Mike Pompeo (who he doesn’t), but Saudi Arabia’s March 2015 decision to go to war against the Iranian-allied Houthi tribal movement in Yemen —`which is,' he argues, `how all of this nonsense got started in the first place.'”

Perry's article is enlightening and important.

However, here at Colonel Lang's Committee of Correspondence, the early warning was immediately sounded, first in April 2015, re-published 2 September 2016, and republished again 30 August 2019.

So, read it again. The writing is on the wall. Col. Lang's original posting: 

IMO Saudi Arabia lacks the military capability to intervene successfully in Yemen.  This is equally true in what was North Yemen (YAR) and also in the former PDRY.  SA's armed forces were always built for show with a lot of expensive equipment that they were never capable of employing except at the elementary "stick and rudder" level of operations.  The maintenance contracts for all that equipment have always been impressive.   On the ground the Saudis possess a Wahhabi beduin manned force in the SANG that is designed to maintain population and territorial control and in its more modern parts to overawe the Twelver Shia majority population of the Eastern Province (where the oil and gas is located).  The rest of the Saudi Land Forces are pretty much a jobs program for poor people from the Asir and Najd regions.  In its warlike pronouncements thus far SA is mimicking the PR employed by he US, but such PR methods do not win wars against determined opponents.  Egypt is dragging its feet.  The coalition allies have contributed little except for the US.  pl

***********

"Ground troops would certainly face stiff resistance from the Houthi militiamen. Seasoned guerrilla fighters, they seized parts of southern Saudi Arabia during a brief war in 2009, killing over 100 Saudi troops.

Saudi Arabia has not ruled out a ground attack, but its allies appear wary of such a move. The kingdom has asked Pakistan to commit troops to the campaign, but that country is deeply divided over participating in an operation that could anger its own Shiite minority.

Though fraught with risk, continued airstrikes and a possible ground incursion may be the only choices that Saudi Arabia sees itself as having, said Imad Salamey, a Middle East expert at Lebanese American University. He said that officials in Riyadh probably are concerned that relenting could be perceived as weakness, especially by Iran."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/saudi-air-war-struggles-to-make-gains-as-yemen-fragments/2015/04/09/1a045766-ddf6-11e4-b6d7-b9bc8acf16f7_story.html

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IMO Saudi Arabia is headed for an embarrassing failure in Yemen, one that will reveal its true nature as a gang of nepotistic hedonists sitting on immense wealth.

What could be more tempting?  pl 

 

 

Experience Saudi Arabia! Don't do it...

"Tourism chief Ahmed Al Khateeb said abayas will not be mandatory for women tourists but modest dress is, including at public beaches.

Visas will be available online for about $80 (Dh294), with no restrictions for unaccompanied women as in the past. Access to the Muslim holy cities of Makkah and Medina is restricted.

Further details of the new visa rules will be announced on Friday evening at 10.30pm UAE time during an unveiling ceremony scheduled to take place at Ad Diriyah, a Unesco (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) World Heritage Site in Riyadh."

Currently only citizens of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, and the UAE can travel freely to the country."  Gulf News

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What a treat! A visit to a theocratic police state where religious volunteer police wander the country looking for sinners as defined in the Hanbali sharia law code of the country.   There is no civil law code, none, and the Hanbali school of Sunni law restricts the basis of judicial decisions to Qur'an and Hadith.  This last  is the Hanbali accepted corpus of traditions of the practice and utterances of the Prophet and the early Muslim community living in the Mecca/Medina area.  This excludes the mass of case law consulted by judges in the other three Sunni "schools" of law and the entire Shia world. 

Once you enter SA as a tourist you will be be completely at the mercy of the Bone Saw Man's whims.  Women alone will be looked at by the populace as whores who have not yet been punished.  Relationships between members of tourist groups will be carefully scrutinized.  Public displays of affection will be noted.  A woman emerging from a hotel in a short sleeved dress or God Forbid! in shorts will be reminded of her lack of modesty and doubtful morality.  Blasphemous utterance questioning the Way of God will have to be corrected.

And what is there to see, "Meda'in Salih?  This was a frontier outpost of the Nabataean state.  Go to Jordan and see the Nabataean capital at Petra AND have a G & T at the end of the day in a government run hotel.  In Jordan on Sunday you can go to church.  In SA there  are not churches and Christians who pray together in secret are arrested and imprisoned.

Go to a decent place like; Jordan, Oman, Morocco, Turkey  pl

https://gulfnews.com/world/gulf/saudi/its-official-saudi-is-open-to-tourists-from-around-the-world-1.1569496913496

RUMORBLOWER NOT WHISTLEBLOWER by Larry C Johnson

Now that we have seen the whistleblower complaint filed by a CIA officer against President Trump, there should be little doubt that it is a fraud and represents an abuse of the whistleblower process. I know genuine whistleblowers (e.g., Bill Binney, Kirk Wiebe, Ed Loomis, Thomas Drake, John Kiriakou, etc.) and have been one myself. I am familiar with the kind of information one must possess (or should possess) in order to initiate a complaint. This complaint does not even meet the stupid standard. It is a trumped up complaint.

This CIA officer who filed the complaint has no direct evidence or knowledge. He heard things from other people. He was not party to the phone conversation and did not have access to the transcript. Instead, he cited public media as “corroboration” for his allegations, including reports by John Solomon.

The whistleblower is supposedly an analyst. Pray to God he is not. If this is an example of this clown's analytical chops then we now know why the CIA has been on the downward slide. Rather than focus on evidence and facts, this guy relied on rumor.

Canned Soup

Question:  Why do Millennials not eat canned minestrone soup?

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP 26 SEPTEMBER 2019 by Patrick Armstrong

RUSSIA INC. Another must-read report from Awara on the Russian economy. Bottom line: "In a global recession, no country is safe, but Russia looks to have quite a lot going for it in terms of economic advantages... by far the lowest debt of all major countries. All economic actors... are economically solid and minimally leveraged... government virtually debtless, but it has again replenished its spectacular forex and sovereign wealth fund reserves... hefty budget surplus... Russia runs the world’s third biggest trade surplus...We also need to point out that Russia has an enormous strength by way of being the world’s most self-sufficient major country. Russia has the by far lowest level of imports relative to GDP of all countries." Discussion of the true state of the Russian economy is hindered by two errors: while oil and gas are two-thirds of its exports, they're only 10% of the total economy (and getting smaller). Secondly, measuring Russia's GDP in USD is useless – Russia, is a full-service economy. Further discussion by Hellevig here: "while Russia does not export a great deal of manufactured goods, it produces by far a bigger share of those for the domestic market than any other country... The Western world is in turmoil: the previous overwhelming geopolitical domination is gone and over with; military solutions against the main adversaries – China and Russia – are off the books; hybrid wars against them have failed; China and Russia are economically stronger than ever, too strong for the adversary..."

RUSSIAN ARMED FORCES. Good interview with Minister of Defence Shoygu on how they started all over again to build them up. (Russian only but use a machine translator).

ELECTIONS. The bottom line in Moscow: low turnout, pedestal party retained majority but lost somewhat. Karlin thinks Navalniy's strategy made have made a bit of a difference (in a 22% turnout, mind you.) Otherwise the pedestal party pretty well kept control. Not much of anything, really. Russian politics remain dull, uninspired and stagnant which either means that people are generally satisfied or that they've given up. Turnouts are now getting as low as they are in the West.

CORRUPTION. A very senior policeman was arrested in a sting and charged with extortion yesterday.

WITH A THIN SMILE Putin offers hypersonic weapons to the USA and SAMs to Saudi Arabia.

BROWDER. Magnitskiy's family (remember him? Browder's honest lawyer murdered in jail by corrupt cops?) brought a case against Russia in the European Court of Human Rights. It was thrown out: read it here "This judgement utterly explodes the accepted narrative, and does it very succinctly". Bet your local news outfit never tells you that the entire base of the "Magnitskiy" case has been punctured by a Western court. Not the first time that a pillar of the anti-Russia mindset has been exploded in a real court. Here's another ruling by the same court. Good betting assumption for analysts: Moscow tells the truth much more often than Western governments or media do.

SMOLENKOV. I doubt it: Johnson's take smells right to me.

THE COST OF GETTING RUSSIA WRONG. We've just learned that Putin phoned Bush two days before 911 warning him that something big was coming out of Afghanistan. Other Russian warnings were ignored; one reason being Condoleezza Rice's belief that it was "Russian bitterness toward Pakistan for supporting the Afghan mujahideen". She was supposed to be a "Russia expert" too! A flat learning curve: error piled on conceit piled on complacency.

G7. Trump and Macron have hinted at Russia's being invited into the G7/8. Putin said he's ready to host so long as China and India attend too. A polite way of saying 1) no thanks 2) G7 is not very important.

UKRAINE. Some interesting stirrings. An investigation against Parubiy over his involvement in the Odessa massacre has been opened. Several investigations of Poroshenko. At least a re-look into the Maidan shootings. The prisoner exchange was a good sign although the western media didn't notice that most of the 70 people exchanged were, in the eyes of Kiev, Ukrainian citizens. This is important because in a real war you capture citizens of the other side, in a civil war you capture your own citizens and call them traitors. Ergo, it's a civil war, but the West pretends it is not.

PAINTED CORNER. Iran and/or its allies have just given Washington a lesson on what "maximum pressure" really looks like and there's a story that Trump is looking at a French plan that allows Washington to get out and pretend victory. Bolton's absence may make this possible.

TRUMP-ZELENSKY PHONE CALL. The Democrat Party has found a new rake to step on.

MACRON SPEECH. Certainly saying unsayable things. We'll see whether it's just a speech though.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Canada Russia Observer

Letters by the complainant and inspector general about the president's phone call to Ukraine

By Robert Willmann

The letter of 12 August 2019 and possibly the entire appendix from the complainant to Congressional Committee chairs about the president's 25 July 2019 telephone call to Ukraine was released, with a few redactions (9 pages)--

https://intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20190812_-_whistleblower_complaint_unclass.pdf

The letter of 26 August 2019 from the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community to Joseph Maguire, the Acting Director of National Intelligence, about the complainant's letter and appendix, was also released (7 pages)--

https://intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20190826_-_icig_letter_to_acting_dni_unclass.pdf

Joseph Maguire (Vice Adm., ret.) is testifying before the House Intelligence Committee.

Update, 1:52 p.m.   The complaint was most likely written by a lawyer, or a lawyer helped the person write it.  The main clues are the use of the term "inter alia" on pages 2 and 4, and the wording of footnote 1 on page 2.

Open Thread on the effort to expel Trump from office through impeachment.

It takes a simple majority (218) for the House of Representatives to pass a bill of impeachment against any federal official.  The Democrats have 232 seats in the present congress.  The Bill (equivalent to an indictment) then is transferred to the US Senate where the impeached person is tried before the US Senate with the Chief Justice of the United State presiding.. 2/3 of the senators must vote for conviction for that to occur.  Two presidents have been impeached.  None has been convicted.

This thread will be open for a long time.  pl

Saudi/US forces resume bombing Yemen targets.

"The Saudi Coalition has resumed their air campaign over Yemen this week after a short-lived peace deal was put in place following the Saudi Aramco strikes.

According to a new report from Yemen, the Saudi Coalition heavily bombed several sites inside the country, including a number of Houthi positions in the Amran and Dhale governorates."  AMN

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My sources tell me that Saudi/Yemen rebels talks were held for several days this week following the Yemeni air attacks at Abqaiq and Kharais.  These Talks were held in Muscat, Oman under the protection of Sultan Qaboos, ruler of Oman.

Yesterday Pompeo scoffed at the idea that the Yemeni rebels had carried out the air attacks.  Well, pilgrims, the willingness of the Saudis to negotiate with them over the issue belies that.

And now, Saudi Arabia (with US air refueling and targeting assistance) has suddenly resumed bombing of Yemeni targets.  IMO the neocon dominated government of the US has pressured the Saudis to do this to support Pompeo's assertion.

The Yemeni rebels have stated that if the Saudis and the UAE do not want a negotiated peace, then attacks on these two countries will resume.  We will see.  pl

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/saudi-coalition-resumes-airstrikes-over-yemen-after-short-lived-peace-deal/

A dog for the Donald

I watched DJT perform today at the UN.  Impressive.  Stayed on script.  I suppose PomPom's Borgist boys and girls wrote it.  It hit all the commandments in the neocon creed but Trump managed not to issue any ultimata leading to war .  That was good, very good.  And now, pilgrims, Nancy the Pelosi is collapsing in her resistance to the Passion Play that is, in the minds, of some of her children the Auto da Impeachment in which Trump MUST be led to the faggots wearing his dunce cap.   This is something they are likely to regret because it just pisses a lot of people off, people who might not have voted for the Orange One.

Trumpie is, nevertheless, IMO, a perfect example of a Triple Type A personality type.  His kind of folk have no time for people, plants or pets.  Spot is perfect.  You don't have to pet it.  It cares no more for you than you do for it.  IOW, not at all.  And you can have it patrol the WH at night looking for intruders.

I suppose you have to plug it in like a Tesla to recharge once in a while. 

You could equip it to come when called.  "Here, Spot. Here!"  pl

https://www.theverge.com/2019/9/24/20880511/boston-dynamics-spot-robot-mini-hands-on-lease-buy

Forget The Palm restaurants

SWMBO and I ate at the Palm on 19th Street in DC for many years. It was long the ultimate in Italian steakhouses. The food went downhill and then improved. We went there last night for her birthday. The place has IMO become just another expense account dump. Food was mediocre. The service was cloying and obsequious. They couldn't even get the takehomes right. i cut up my 837 Club card today and have written them They will not see us again.  pl

“Military experts believe Iranian-made drones set off from Yemen to strike Aramco" ra'i al yowm

I was provided this translation by Alastair Crooke's  "The Raw and the Cooked" on line magazine published from Crooke's location in Beirut.  This a very fine subscription service and I recommend it highly.   [email protected]  is their contact e-mail address.  pl 

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“Military experts believe Iranian-made drones set off from Yemen to strike Aramco

Rai al-Youm daily, 17 Sept 2019

The military commanders in the USA are keeping silent with regards to the source of the attacks that targeted the Aramco oil facilities last Saturday and that caused some serious damages there. It seems that the Houthis have used Iranian-made modern drones and that a commando unit from Saudi land served to steer the drones at the last few minutes prior to the strikes.
“So far, the statements of the American politicians are leading the list of accusations directed at Iran for allegedly being responsible for the attacks... The American politicians are speaking about Iran’s responsibility although the Houthis have released a statement where they stressed that they stand behind this operation knowing that the Houthis have always been honest in their military statements in order to gain the trust of the international media outlets.

“The odd part consists of the silence of the American military commanders. Indeed, there has been no official report released by the Pentagon that accuses Iran. Furthermore, no senior military officers made any statements to accuse Iran. The senior officers and military experts are actually cautious and not taking the risk of making any incorrect statements. They realize that the arsenal of the American radars at the Arabian Gulf including the land and the ship-mounted radars have recorded at least half the drones’ flight, which is enough data to tell the source.

“The Abqaiq station is geographically close to Bahrain and Qatar. It is thus close to the American Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, which is equipped with modern radars. It is also close to the Al-Udeid base in Qatar, which is home to the most modern radars of the American military industry. These radars are capable of monitoring the activity of the rockets and drones coming from Iran or Iraq. If these radars failed to do that, then this constitutes a scandal for the American military industry knowing that the radars are pointed at Iran.

“The secret behind the US military commanders’ silence and them abstaining from mentioning the source of the drones is because they don’t wish to admit that the drones are Iranian-made and were able to dodge the radars that are deployed in the region. Iran might have smuggled these drones to the Houthis... Iran possesses advanced drones that are capable of flying for long distances while loaded with explosives. These include drones that can carry out suicide missions by striking fixed targets such as the Muhajir, Raad, and Karrar drones. These have succeeded in the past to fly above the American aircraft carriers. Some comments are circulating at the American military chat rooms that go: “If Iran is capable of shooting down a Global Hawk, and if it was able to take photos of the aircraft carriers in the Gulf, then this means that its drones are as advanced as its missiles. This is something that one must admit.”””

Decameron: `The stone that the builders rejected became a cornerstone.'

“Every time I take my youngest daughter, Sham, to her school, I see a passage written on the wall from the Book of Psalms: `The stone that the builders rejected became a cornerstone.' ”    Ayman Odeh, Chairman of Joint List, 13 elected members of Knesset

The Arab-Israeli citizens' votes won the Joint List the rank of 3rd largest bloc in Knesset with 13 seats.   Breaking with their historical pattern of not recommending a PM, the Joint List decided to back Gantz in order to "end" Netanyahu's career, according to a piece by Ayman Odeh’s opinion column that appeared in the New York Times, September 22, 2019.

Opinion | Ayman Odeh: We Are Ending Netanyahu’s Grip on Israel - The New York Times

But, despite the compelling Opinion piece that Odeh had in the New York Times, 3 elected Members of Knesset from the Balad party in his bloc, said that they will not recommend a PM.  This morning, the Times of Israel and other papers published this statement from one of the Joint List party leaders, reportedly from a letter delivered to Israeli President Rivlin on Sunday.   The statement says:

"`I would like to announce that the three Balad Knesset members have asked me as the faction chairman to declare that the Joint List’s recommendation of MK Benny Gantz does not include them, and therefore the recommendation is in the name of ten MKs and not 13,’|” MK Ahmad Tibi of Ta’al wrote in a letter, which was apparently sent to Rivlin on Sunday and published Monday morning.   (Times of Israel)

Now what?

Both Likud and Blue & White are short of the coalition total of 60.  But now, the totals are:

B&W (33 seats) coalition is 54 seats

Likud (31 seats) coalition is 55 or 56 seats

What will President Rivlin do?    Previous presidents have asked the lead party to form a government, but he apparently has some discretion.    

Avigdor Liberman's Yisrael Beiteinu endorsed no-one, leaving 8 seats in the balance.   That could make either bloc take the government, but he has said "NO" to religious parties, and it was he who essentially brought down Netanyahu after the April election.   What is Liberman, standard bearer for the “Russian” vote, made of?  We will see. 

Possibilities

Rivlin invites Gantz to form a government based on B&W's 33 seats.

Rivlin invites Netanyahu to form a government, based on the fact that his "coalition" (Likud + religious parties+ extreme right wing settlers/annexationists) has 1 or 2 commitments more than B&W

Grand Coalition without Netanyahu:  B&W with Gantz PM, Likud, Yisrael Beiteinu: PM will rotate, Gantz first.

Grand Coalition with Netanyahu: B&W, Likud, Yisrael Beiteinu. Almost the same as the last 12 years; very unstable, B&W or YB could leave at any time.

New Elections:   Rivlin goes with one of the above options which doesn't make it. 

To be clear, Liberman has said all along that his party will NOT join a government endorsed by the Arabs; but he also says that his bloc will NOT join a government with the religious parties.  

In Israeli politics, said a recent Israeli newspaper, "anything is possible."

"If you hit them, they will behave ..." - the neocons' song.

I have long puzzled over the question of why the neocons; Lindsey Graham, the late John McCain (be brave Lindsey!), Jack Keane, Bolton, Pompeo, etc., etc., ad nauseam,  cling so firmly to the idea of striking Iran a hard blow.

Today I heard the reason voiced on the Sunday newsies by several of the Faithful.  "If you punish the Iranians they will behave" was the refrain.  "They know they would lose to the US and so would be afraid to go to war with us."  This delusion is a variation of the Rational Actor Model.  This poly sci inspired model is based on the false premise that everyone, everywhere functions on the basis of the same priorities and values.  This is an untruth.  For example, a willingness to die for one's country is not a universally shared attitude.  Nor is, a belief in an almighty God who dictates one's duty in this world.  A god in whom the Muslims actually believe as expressed in the shahada (testimony) depicted above.

So, pilgrims, the neocons believe that if the Iranians are punished like children who are spanked for picking their noses, they will recognize the error of their ways and the country will accept the will of the US and more importantly of the Zionists who are IMO the source of such a belief.  Zionism seeks a ME pacified with regard to the existence and hegemony of the Jewish State. 

To that end the Zionists have followed a relentless practice of punishing their opponents in order to bring them to heel.  That has never worked for them but they persist in this "strategery" and have clearly convinced a critical number of movers and shakers in the US to follow their lead.  pl

Haddock on the grill tonight

Tired of the Abqaiq thing.  It appears that DJT will not go to war over this.  My guess is that the Saudis don't want him to start a war on their doorstep and his innate aversion to risk accepts that easily.  Thank God.

Haddock:  A species of cod, prevalent in the North Atlantic and much favored in New England.  These were nice fresh fillets .  Medium heat, anointed with a little olive oil, a touch of citrus flavored soy, salt, pepper, garlic, ginger and mustard powder.  Five minutes on a side brought it to 145 Fahrenheit internally. Perfect.   A delicate fish.  You have to be careful with it or it will fall apart before you can get it to the table.  pl

Beware False Flag Attacks - Opinion by Walrus.

The corollary to the Houthis brilliant use of do - it - yourself drones and perhaps cruise missiles, is that anyone else can do the same. This makes the possibility of false flag attacks using such weapons more likely in my opinion. Such attacks would not even necessarily require the resources of a State actor to execute, all the materials, bar perhaps the explosive, are freely available around the globe.

I will not explain the mechanics of manufacturing such weapons. Take it from me that a group of determined hobbyists could do so, provided they have sufficient security and money. Such weapons could be labeled for example “made in Iran” in such depth that it would be impossible to refute their origin, no matter how good ones forensics are.

A State actor, perhaps bent on mischief, could do this rather quickly. While this is just a guess, I would be surprised if various Western countries security services did not already have an operation underway to replicate the Houthi achievements, if only to answer the politicians question: “How did they do that??” and to start thinking about countermeasures.

My reason for being concerned enough to raise this topic is that President Trump has committed troops to Saudi Arabia and we already have other troops and assets in the region. If they were subject to attack and we took casualties, I don’t see how the President could avoid war assuming Iran was blamed.

What triggered me was this article in the WSJ (paywalled) whose opening sentence is:

"Yemeni Rebels Warn Iran Plans Another Strike Soon

“BEIRUT—Houthi militants in Yemen have warned foreign diplomats that Iran is preparing a follow-up strike to the missile and drone attack that crippled Saudi Arabia’s oil industry a week ago, people familiar with the matter said.

Leaders of the group said they were raising the alarm about the possible new attack after they were pressed by Iran to play a role in it”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/yemeni-rebels-warn-iran-plans-another-strike-soon-11569105344

Once technology is out of the box, as the Houthis have demonstrated, it can’t be returned. How do we avoid false flag attacks?"

 

“Breaking: Houthis to halt missile strikes after Saudi Arabia offers peace deal” says Al Masdar News - TTG

Earlier today Al Masdar News ran a story that caught my eye. If true, it was an acknowledgement by the Saudis that it was the Houthis who droned the shit out of their oil facility and were clearly capable doing it again.

—————

BEIRUT, LEBANON (9:10 P.M.) – The Houthi Movement (var. Ansarallah Movement) announced on Friday that they are halting their missiles strikes on Saudi Arabia after the Gulf kingdom offered them a peace deal. According to the Houthi Movement, the Saudi Coalition offered to halt their airstrikes over Yemen in exchange for the halting of all Houthi missile strikes.

This announcement from the Yemeni group comes just days after the Houthi forces bombed one of the largest Saudi Aramco oil facilities inside Saudi Arabia. (AMN)

—————

However, no other news agency has repeated the line about the Saudis offering a peace deal. All other accounts speak of a Houthi offering of a mutual ceasefire in the air war. The Almasirah Media Network, a Yemeni TV channel affiliated with the Houthi Movement, ran the following story concerning the peace offer.

—————

Follow - ups September 20 | In a speech marking the fifth anniversary of the September 21 revolution, President of the Supreme Political Council Mehdi Mashat launched a peace initiative in which he called on all parties from all sides of the war to seriously engage in serious and genuine negotiations leading to comprehensive national reconciliation that does not exclude anyone from injecting blood. In the interest of the remaining bonds of brotherhood and to overcome the higher national interests.

He announced the cessation of the targeting of Saudi territory by flying planes, ballistic missiles, wings and all forms of targeting. "We are waiting for the same or better greetings in a similar announcement to stop all forms of targeting and aerial bombardment of our Yemeni territory and reserve the right to respond if this initiative is not met," he said. (Google translation)

—————

Did Al Masdar get it wrong? Perhaps the Saudis are trying to keep any ceasefire offer on the down low. They have demonstrated that the very idea that the Houthis carried out the successful strike on Aramco facility is beyond embarrassing. They are loath to admit it and offering peace to the Houthis is doing just that. How can those uncouth hill people do such a thing to the royal sheiks, the guardians of Mecca? We’ll have to see what happens next. Will there be an unannounced lull in the Saudi air campaign against the Houthis or will there be another Houthi drone strike on a Saudi target. In my opinion it could go either way.

TTG

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/breaking-houthis-to-halt-missile-strikes-after-saudi-arabia-offers-peace-deal/

https://www.almasirah.net/details.php?es_id=45095&cat_id=3

BRAKING NEWS--TRUMP PRESSURED UKRAINE TO FIRE PROSECUTOR by Larry C Johnson

I think the Democrats finally have corralled Donald Trump.

I think the transcripts flagged by the unnamed intel community whistleblower will show that Donald Trump threatened to withhold foreign aid to Ukraine unless the Ukrainian leader fired a prosecutor who was investigating a company that paid Donald Jr. and Eric millions of dollars. Following this demand the Ukrainian prosecutor was fired and the investigation terminated.

But wait, there is more. The Trump boys also flew to China with their Dad and snared a 1.5 BILLION Chinese investment in their hedge fun. I am sure you will agree this is impeachable.

Wait. BREAKING NEWS. Put the BRAKES on the BRAKING NEWS. I made a mistake. The person who did this was NOT Donald Trump, it was Joe Biden and his greedy offspring, Hunter. (If you caught the "BRAKING" in the title you get extra points.)

According to a knowledgeable source, the Whistleblower story that much of the media is losing their minds over is a desperate effort to protect Joe Biden. While it is true that Donald Trump had a conversation with the Ukrainian President and the topic of investigating Joe Biden's son for getting payments from a corrupt Ukrainian oligarch,  that is not illegal nor improper once you understand the back story.

Here’s the back story courtesy of Jim Hoft at The Gateway Pundit:

"Will bishops at last be held to account in abuse cases? We’re about to find out." Washpost editorial

" ... the published list had been whittled down by the bishop and church lawyers to exclude, among others, accused priests who had been left in ministry or restored after a suspension. In one case, a church lawyer wrote to the bishop that a priest alleged to have had sex with a teenage girl in the 1980s should be dropped from the list because including him “might require explanation.” (The priest, Fabian J. Maryanski, who has since been placed on leave, denied the allegation.)

Under the church’s new policy on accountability for bishops, it has fallen to Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, the archbishop of New York, to decide whether to launch an investigation of Mr. Malone. As Mr. Dolan mulls that question — his office says an announcement is expected soon — other revelations have surfaced involving Mr. Malone’s less-than-assiduous attention to abuse victims. In an audio recording of a conversation from August, leaked recently by one of his former top assistants, Mr. Malone is heard worrying that “this could be the end for me as bishop.”"  washpost editorial board.

----------------

Despair is an unforgivable sin.  Unforgivable because someone in despair does not believe in the possibility of forgiveness and therefore does not repent.  On that basis I am in a lot of trouble because I despair for the ability of the Roman Catholic Church to purge itself, cauterize the resulting wounds and move on.  I know that I should not despair but I do.

Because of the essentially late Roman Empire structure of the Church the chain of command runs from the Pope to metropolitan archbishops who head eccesiastical provinces and then to suffragan dioceses subordinate to the metropolitan archbishops.

In the case of this fellow Malone, he is the subordinate of Archbisop Dolan in New York City because Buffalo is a diocese within the province which Dolan heads.  So, the buck stops (for the moment) at Dolan's Desk with regard to the question of what to recommend to the Pope about the careerist who sits in the bishop's chair in Buffalo, New York.

"This will finish me as bishop" Malone is quoted as saying of the result of his inaction and harboring of evil priests in Buffalo.   What an unworthy sentiment!  What greater evidence can there be of careerist ambition driven failure as a pastor of souls.

Dolan is a mystery to me.  I have seen him on "Fox and Friends," sprawled in a chair actinng the role of a basic New York City street guy.  He does not inspire me with the vision of a spiritual guide for all those souls spread across his province.

Is Dolan called now to decide about another careerist cleric when he may not be much different?  We will see,  pl

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/will-bishops-at-last-be-held-to-account-in-abuse-cases-were-about-to-find-out/2019/09/19/149ef946-da65-11e9-ac63-3016711543fe_story.html

Iran, We Got to Do Something? by Larry C Johnson

Like a Japanese Kabuki dance Washington is in the grasp of War theater. Many pundits and members of Congress are filling the airwaves and offering up quotes demanding action. Demanding retaliation. We have to stand up to Iran. Only one little problem, the intel on the attack on the Saudi oil installations remains sketchy and hidden.

If the missiles were fired from Iranian territory then our intel collection certainly captured the launch or tracked the origin of the drones or missiles used in the attack. So where is it? I have heard from reliable sources that the info is being kept behind a highly classified wall and only those with access to this particular compartmented info can see it.

I only see four possibilities:

1. The missiles/drones were launched from Iran.
2. The missiles/drones were launched from Yemen.
3. The missiles/drones were launched from a maritime platform in the Persian Gulf
4. The missiles/drones were landed from a country that borders Saudi Arabia, such as Iraq.

Hmmm. I do not believe that if we had solid proof the attack came from Iranian territory that the United States would keep that info behind a Top Secret wall. I also doubt that we would try to hide the fact that the missiles/drones came from Yemen.

What if the missiles/drones came out of Iraq? That is something we would try to keep quiet. Having to admit that our "ally" (Iraq) was the origin of the attack brings with it a whole host of foreign policy problems. 

Open Thread 19 September 2019

  pl

How about a Moon Elevator?

" ... the Columbia study differs from previous proposal in an important way: instead of building the elevator from the Earth’s surface (which is impossible with today’s technology), it would be anchored on the moon and stretch some 200,000 miles toward Earth until hitting the geostationary orbit height (about 22,236 miles above sea level), at which objects move around Earth in lockstep with the planet’s own rotation.

Dangling the space elevator at this height would eliminate the need to place a large counterweight near Earth’s orbit to balance out the planet’s massive gravitational pull if the elevator were to be built from ground up. This method would also prevent any relative motion between Earth’s surface and space below the geostationary orbit area from bending or twisting the elevator.

These won’t be problems for the moon because the lunar gravitational pull is significantly smaller and the moon’s orbit is tidally locked, meaning that the moon keeps the same face turned toward Earth during its orbit, therefore no relative motion of the anchor point."

"After doing the math, the researchers estimated that the simplest version of the lunar elevator would be a cable thinner than a pencil and weigh about 88,000 pounds, which is within the payload capacity of the next-generation NASA or SpaceX rocket.

The whole project may cost a few billion dollars, which is “within the whim of one particularly motivated billionaire,” said Penoyre.

Future moon travelers will still have to ride a rocket, though, to fly up to the elevator’s dangling point, and then transfer to a robotic vehicle, which would climb up the cable all the way up to the moon."  Observer

---------------

Incredibly great idea.  I have long favored the idea of space elevators but the tensile strength of carbon fiber cable has not been up to the task for earth to orbit elevators.

I would like to sign up for one of the first tickets to the South Pole Lunar Base.  pl

https://observer.com/2019/09/moon-space-elevator-lunar-exploration-columbia-study/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_space_elevator

 

Robert C. O'Brien is appointed to be the new National Security Advisor

By Robert Willmann

President Trump appointed Robert C. O'Brien to be the new National Security Advisor.  He is presently the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs at the U.S. Department of State--

https://www.state.gov/biographies/robert-c-obrien/

Here is some initial material about him.  He has been associated with Mitt Romney and John Bolton for quite a while, and is a Mormon.  He is a lawyer operating primarily out of California in a firm called Larson O'Brien--

https://www.larsonobrienlaw.com/attorney-detail/robert-c-o-brien

Apparently he and Hugh Hewitt, who appears some on television and radio, moved from one law firm to the present one.  Hewitt seems to no longer be in that firm.  But their association has led to interviews of O'Brien by Hewitt. 

O'Brien was a foreign policy advisor to Mitt Romney both times he ran for president.  Other people such as Michael Hayden and Michael Chertoff were also unfortunately advising Romney in 2012.  O'Brien was said to be a foreign policy advisor to Scott Walker and Senator Ted Cruz during the 2016 presidential campaign.  This transcript is from 23 August 2012--

https://www.hughhewitt.com/romney-senior-foreign-policy-advisor-robert-c-obrien/

In 2016 O'Brien wrote a book entitled "While America Slept, Restoring American Leadership to a World in Crisis", published by Encounter Books.  He did around a 12-minute interview on 15 September 2016 with Hewitt about the book, making general comments about policy--

https://www.hughhewitt.com/wp-content/uploads/09-15hhs-obrien.mp3

A 28 March 2018 interview with O'Brien is about John Bolton being made National Security Advisor--

https://www.hughhewitt.com/robert-c-obrien-long-time-colleague-of-ambassador-john-bolton-on-president-trumps-selection-of-bolton-for-the-nsa/

From the type of legal cases he has been involved in, he should have a smoother and more palatable demeanor than John Bolton, but his philosophies are what matter.  We will see how they play out.

 

What a war with Iran would be ...

Mr. President, I believe that the Iranians will fight us with everything they have if we go to war with them.

• You have several thousand soldiers in Iraq and Syria.  These countries have large proxy forces of Iran's allies in the form of Shia militias in Iraq and actual Iranian Quds Force troops in Syria.  These forces will be used to attack and kill our soldiers.
• The Iranians have significant numbers of ballistic missiles which they have already said will be used against our forces
• The US Navy has many ships in the Gulf and the Arabian Sea.  The Iranian Navy and the IRGC Navy will attack our naval vessels until the Iranian forces are utterly destroyed.  In that process the US Navy will loose men and ships.
• In direct air attacks on Iran we are bound to lose aircraft and air crew.
• The IRGC and its Quds Force will carry out terrorist attacks across the world.

Do you really want to be a one term president?

Pompeo can talk big now and then go back to Kansas to run for senator. 

Where will you be able to take refuge? 

Don't let the neocons like Pompeo sell you on war.

Make the intelligence people show you the evidence in detail.  Make your own judgments.  pl

"Detailed satellite photos show extent of ‘surgical’ attack damage to Saudi Aramco oil facilities" CNBC

"Satellite photos released by the U.S. government and DigitalGlobe reveal the surgical precision with which Saudi Aramco’s oil facilities were struck in attacks early Saturday.

The strikes, which unidentified U.S. officials have said involved at least 20 drones and several cruise missiles, forced Saudi Arabia to shut down half its oil production capacity, or 5.7 million barrels per day of crude — 5% of the world’s global daily oil production.

The images, first obtained by The Associated Press, show that at least 19 strikes were launched and 17 actually hit targets."  CNBC

--------------

I get a big kick out of those of you who think someone faked this attack for, what;

An excuse to go to war with Iran?

An opening gambit to get the Iranians to talk to Trump at the UN?   If so, that did not work.  Khamenei has said unequivocally that they are not going to talk to the US.

Mikey Pompeo is now going to travel to Saudi Arabia to see if he can jawbone the Saudis into saying that it was undoubtedly the Iranians who done it.  Would that be going on if the Saudis had been in the plot?

So, some of you think that the Saudis blew up their own processing plant for some nefarious reason.

Or, maybe the Izzies blew it up to start a war?

Will wonders never cease?  I mean you, not the attack.  pl

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/17/satellite-photos-show-extent-of-damage-to-saudi-aramco-plants.html

An indictment for McCabe is not needed to try him, or is it?

"In many—if not all—U.S. jurisdictions that use grand juries, prosecutors often have a choice between seeking an indictment from a grand jury and filing a charging document directly with the court. Such a document is usually called an information, accusation, or complaint, to distinguish it from a grand-jury indictment. To protect the suspect's due-process rights in felony cases (where the suspect's interest in liberty is at stake), there is usually a preliminary hearing, at which a judge determines whether there was probable cause to arrest the suspect who is in custody. If the judge finds such probable cause, he or she binds, or holds over, the suspect for trial."  wiki on indictment in the US

------------

A question has arisen of whether or not a grand jury in the District of Columbia will indict officials of the government who were allies of the Obama Administration.  DC is a heavily Democratic place.

This wiki makes it clear that a "true bill" indictment from a grand jury is not necessary for prosecution.  Such an indictment is merely customary in most cases from respect for our English Common Law heritage.

IMO it is doubtful that a petit jury in DC would convict during actual trials. 

Alternatively, this difficulty as well as the one with the grand jury could be overcome by changing the venue of the proceeding to the Eastern Federal Court District for Virginia where IMO both an indictment and conviction would be very likely.  The demographics and politics are much different on this side of the Potomac in a district that covers the whole eastern half of the Commonwealth of Virginia.  pl

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indictment#United_States

Meet the Quds1 cruise missile. Made in Yemen?

"On September 14, several explosions rocked the Khurais oilfield as well as the Abqaiq refinery, one of Saudi Arabia’s most vital petrochemical installations. Several hours later, the Houthis claimed that they had targeted both facilities with ten drones as part of their “Balance of Deterrence” campaign.

What made this attack different from other recorded Houthi drone attacks was not only the unprecedented amount of material damage caused but also lingering doubt about the nature and the attribution of the attack. First, a video allegedly showing flying objects entering Kuwaiti airspace led to speculation that like a previous “Houthi” drone attack this strike might actually have originated in Iraq or even Iran. While the video remains unverified, the fact that the Kuwaiti government launched a probe into the issue lends some credence to the idea that something might have happened over Kuwait that day. Speculation about the origins of the attack was further fueled by a tweet by Mike Pompeo in which he claimed that there was no evidence the attacks came from Yemen.

Then the question arose whether drones had been used at all, or whether the attack might in fact have been a missile strike. Previous Houthi drone strikes against oil facilities tended to result in quite limited damage which could be an indication that a different weapons system was used this time. Indeed, Aramco came to the conclusion that its facilities were attacked by missiles. Even more curious, several pictures began to emerge on social media purportedly showing the wreckage of a missile in the Saudi desert. While the images appear real, neither the date the photos were taken nor their location can be verified. Social media users quickly claimed the images showed a crashed Iranian-made Soumar cruise missile. The Soumar and its updated version, the Hoveyzeh, are Iran’s attempts at reverse-engineering the Soviet-designed KH-55 cruise missile, several of which the country illegally imported from Ukraine in the early 2000s. Others claimed it was the Quds 1, a recently unveiled Houthi cruise missile often claimed to be a rebranded Soumar."  armscontrolwonl

---------------

TTG raised the issue of whether or not this wave of strikes was done by UAVs or cruise missiles.  IMO this cruise missile could be built in Yemen with Iranian assistance.   I am very interested in the question of what the actual vector of the attacks was in this case.  pl

/www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1208062/meet-the-quds-1/

Michael Flynn's Motion to Compel Brady Evidence is Compelling by Larry C Johnson

For those who have not taken time to read what Michael Flynn's lawyer filed with the court (it was initially sealed) you now no longer have an excuse. I am going to spoon feed you. The motion is compelling and tells a very different story about General Flynn's case. Here's the bottomline--the Obama Administration illegally spied on Flynn and were working in concert with Fusion GPS. This was illegal.

Flynn's attorney, the amazing Sidney Powell, is demanding access to forty items of information. Let's review them one-by-one:

1. A letter delivered by the British Embassy to the incoming National Security team after Donald Trump’s election, and to outgoing National Security Advisor Susan Rice (the letter apparently disavows former British Secret Service Agent Christopher Steele, calls his credibility into question, and declares him untrustworthy).

Got that? With Trump on his way to the White House the Brits realized that their previous actions of spying against Trump were likely to be exposed. They were witting of Christopher Steele's efforts to paint Trump as a Russia stooge and apparently decided to try to get out front and, like the police inspector in Casablanca, profess shock that there was gambling in the casino. Untrustworthy? One more nail in the whole sordid FISA warrant fiasco. If the Brits had informed the U.S. Government that Steele could not be trust then how could Comey and McCabe and Rosenstein sign off on the FISA warrant to spy on Carter Page? I also would like to know who tipped off Sidney Powell to this juicy piece of evidence.

2. The original draft of Mr. Flynn’s 302 and 1A-file, and any FBI document that identifies everyone who had possession of it (parts of which may have been leaked to the press, but the full original has never been produced). This would include information given to Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates on January 24 and 25, 2017.

What did the FBI and Obama DOJ know and when did they know it? There was nothing that General Flynn did the met the threshold for allowing the U.S. Government to collect against him. But that did not stop the lawless Obama team from going after him.

3. All documents, notes, information, FBI 302s, or testimony regarding Nellie Ohr’s research on Mr. Flynn and any information about transmitting it to the DOJ, CIA, or FBI.

This is a bombshell. We already know, thanks to testimony from Nellie's husband, Bruce Ohr, that he was passing info gathered by Nellie as an employee of Fusion GPS to the FBI. This means Fusion GPS was not collecting only on Donald Trump, but was going after others in the Trump campaign. If the FBI used any of this information to target Flynn with FISA collection they have a big problem.

 

Houthi UAVs set big Saudi refinery alight. al-jazeere, etc.

"Saudi Arabia is shutting down half of its oil production after drones attacked the world’s largest oil processing facility in the kingdom, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The closure will impact almost five million barrels of crude production a day, about 5% of the world’s daily oil production, the WSJ reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.

Early Saturday, an oilfield operated by Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil giant, was attacked by a number of drones, which sparked a huge fire at a processor crucial to global energy supplies.

Yemen’s Houthi rebels have claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was one of their largest attacks ever inside the kingdom, the WSJ reported.

“We promise the Saudi regime that our future operations will expand and be more painful as long as its aggression and siege continue,” a Houthi spokesman said. The attack deployed 10 drones, the Houthis said."  CNBC

-------------

Watch the al-jazeera video linked below. 

Some time ago, an "expert" on toy UAVs expressed an opinion on my FB page that the Houthis must be trucking these drones up to within a few miles of the target before flying them.  This attack would seem to exclude this possibility.  The question of the size of the payload also is intriguing because of the amount of damage inflicted, and then there is the matter of the guidance system. 

This is a game changer.  pl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6BgA54VZBk

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/14/saudi-arabia-is-shutting-down-half-of-its-oil-production-after-drone-attack-wsj-says.html

HARPER: CARLSON HAILS DEPARTURE OF 'LEFTIST' BOLTON

On Wednesday night, Fox News host Tucker Carlson rightfully celebrated the firing of John Bolton as National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump.  With no shortage of irony, Carlson noted that many left progressives, particularly those closely associated with former President Barack Obama, lamented Bolton's departure.  Top of the list was Samantha Power, the humanitarian interventionist who was instrumental in the Libya debacle and almost succeeded in getting Obama to go all-in with war against Syria.  "Fundamentally Bolton was a man of the left," Carlson declared.

He explained:  Bolton never saw a problem that could not be solved by government intervention.  That, Carlson noted, is characteristic of the left, not the right.

Whether Carlson intended to dig deeper or not, the reality is that Bolton's brand of neoconservatism came directly out of the far left wing of Soviet Communism.  As some may recall, many of the first generation of neoconservatives in the mid-1970s were former followers of Leon Trotsky--card carrying members of the Fourth International.  They merely morphed Trotsky's core idea of permanent revolution into the neoconservative dream of permanent war, permanent regime change.  First Gen neocon godfather Irving Kristol personified the leftist roots of the neocons.  But he was not alone in his early Trotskyite roots.  Other neocons who were part of the Trotskyite New York Intellectuals included:  Seymour Martin Lipset, Nathan Glazer, Leslie Fiedler and Kristol's wife Gertrude Himmelfarb.  They moved from the Young People's Socialist League to the American Enterprise Institute.

Perhaps this is why Bolton, who is a rabid subscriber to the permanent war/permanent regime change dogma, shrieks in protest every time he is called a neocon.

"... Tucker Carlson Pushes for End of the Neo-cons" Reuters and Haaretz

"Carlson concluded by warning about the many other Boltons in the federal bureaucracy, saying that “war may be a disaster for America, but for John Bolton and his fellow neocons, it’s always good business.”

He went on to slam Trump’s special representative for Iran and contender to replace Bolton, Brian Hook, as an “unapologetic neocon” who “has undisguised contempt for President Trump, and he particularly dislikes the president’s nationalist foreign policy.” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif echoed Carlson hours later in a tweet, arguing that "Thirst for war – maximum pressure – should go with the warmonger-in-chief."  Reuters and Haaretz

-------------

Yes, people tend to forget that Bolton and all the other neocons are worshipers at the altar of a secular religion imported to the US by members of the Frankfurt School of Trotskyite German professors in the 1930s.  These people had attempted get the Nazis to consider them allies in a quest for an ordered world.  Alas for them they found that the Nazi scum would not accept them and in fact began preparations to hunt them down.

Thus the migration to America and in particular to the University of Chicago where they developed their credo of world revolution under that guidance of a few philosopher kings like Leo Strauss, the Wohlstetters  and  other academic "geniuses"  They also began an enthusiastic campaign of recruitment of enthusiastic graduate students who carefully disguised themselves as whatever was most useful politically.

They are not conservative at all, not one bit.  Carlson was absolutely right about that. 

They despise nationalism.  They despise the idea of countries.  In that regard they are like all groups who aspire to globalist dominion for their particular ideas.

They should all be driven from government.  pl

 

https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-trump-bolton-neo-cons-iran-fox-news-tucker-carlson-1.7833399?=&ts=_1568393219979b

Tuesday's Bellwether North Carolina Election Did Have a Trump Factor by Larry C Johnson

Tuesday's election in North Carolina's 9th Congressional District was a bellwether and is good news for Donald Trump despite punditry and media nay saying.

But you would not know this from watching or reading the so-called journalists who are being paid to report news. They are  a pathetic, feckless, lazy lot. The special Congressional elections in North Carolina on Tuesday (September 10) exposes their incompetence and bias. The fake-news cable channels prior to Tuesday's election were painting a dire picture for Republican candidate, Dan Bishop. The nitwit pundits on CNN and MSNBC were describing the contest between Bishop and Democrat Dan McCready as a bellwether. Bishop was down in the polls by 17 points and McCready barely lost the fraud tainted election in 2018.

You must first understand why North Carolina was holding this election in an 0ff-election year. The 2018 contest, which was ostensibly won by the Republican candidate, Mark Harris, was declared invalid. The New York Times reported:

Mark Harris, the North Carolina Republican who nearly won a seat in Congress last year but saw his political fortunes collapse after the revelation that his campaign had financed a fraud-tainted voter-turnout effort, said on Tuesday that he would not run in a new election. . . .

Mr. Harris’s decision was not especially surprising in the wake of an evidentiary hearing last week in Raleigh, where state officials and witnesses described an absentee ballot effort that was rife with misconduct. Although Mr. Harris denied any personal wrongdoing, he testified that he had hired the contractor at the center of the scandal, L. McCrae Dowless Jr., and he acknowledged that he gave “incorrect” testimony to the state board last Thursday.

What a great set up for the Democrats. A corrupt Republican who tried to steal the election. And the Democrat? Dan McCready, a young, attractive and articulate candidate who served his country as a Marine. Cannot get better than that unless you change his name to Jesus Christ.

"Democrats should give Trump a win on his trade deal with Mexico and Canada" Washpost (Bezos)

"A TOP priority for President Trump in what’s left of this session of Congress is a vote in the House of Representatives on his trade deal with Mexico and Canada. Passage in the Republican-controlled Senate is all but certain, and, because trade interests don’t track precisely with partisan ones, there would probably be a bipartisan majority for it in the Democratic-controlled House, too — if Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) brings it to the floor. Should she?

A certain naked but understandable political calculation says she should not. Democrats’ primary goal is to resist Mr. Trump; a trade victory could help his 2020 campaign. Better, on this view, to stick to Ms. Pelosi’s current approach — insisting on modifications to the proposal’s labor, environmental and pharmaceutical provisions, and discussing them with Mr. Trump’s trade representative, Robert E. Lighthizer — indefinitely.

The problem is that Mr. Trump might revive his threats to withdraw from the existing trade framework, the North American Free Trade Agreement, damaging the hemispheric economy. Yes, Mr. Trump would bear primary responsibility; indeed, he’s responsible for insisting on renegotiating NAFTA in the first place. On balance, though, it’s better not to gamble with people’s jobs and income, even for an understandable political reason, unless overriding substantive policy concerns justify it."  Washpost

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Yes!  Yes!  For God's sake, yes!  Thank you, Jeff Bezos!  I now have two reasons to like you.  1.  My house is worth more money every day (I live in Alexandria, Virginia) and 2. You want the Pelosi creature to bring the USMCA to a floor vote.

Hallelujah!  pl

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/democrats-should-give-trump-a-win-on-his-trade-deal-with-mexico-and-canada/2019/09/11/ea5be9c6-d3ea-11e9-9610-fb56c5522e1c_story.html

Where we are now in Afghanistan- Editorial Opinion by PL

(Lt. Hamilton VC at Kabul where he commanded Sir Louis Cavangnari's escort)

A year or so after the US intervention in Afghanistan began in 2001 I perceived that there was a danger that US public and government opinion might begin to favor the idea of "nation building" in Afghanistan.  From long experience in and study of the area of Islamicate civilization and its history it seemed clear to me that such an effort would be doomed to failure at any price that one should be willing to pay in; expended effort over time, money and blood shed on all sides. 

The basic problem with Afghanistan is that there "is no there there."  Afghanistan is really a geographical expression rather than a country in the sense understood of the word in the post-Westphalian system of independent states.

Across the Islamicate world from Mauritania to Bangla Desh and beyond to Oceania there is a pronounced tendency to atomization in group perception of identity. Arabs do not identify with Berbers, etc., Tribes and clans within these groups regard all others as rivals and often enemies unless they are needed as temporary allies.

The Islamic religion which holds unity to be an ideal is often thought to be a unifier against the atomizing tendency in these cultures, but in fact there are many, many varieties of Islam, each one believing that it is uniquely favored by God.  This often cancels out whatever unifying effect Islam, as religion, can have.

Afghanistan, created as a buffer between imperial Russia and British India, is an extreme case of atomization among the inhabitants of a state which has recognition in the world political system including membership in the UN.  In spite of that status , a status that might deceive one into believing that there is such a thing as "the Afghan People,"the population of Afghanistan is actually made up of a number of different ethnic nations; Pushtuns, Hazzara, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Turcomans, Arabs, etc.  These different  peoples all speak mutually unintelligible languages which often have such extreme separation in dialect that this amounts to uninteligibility as well.   Some of these groups are Sunni and others Shia.  This is yet another factor in the separation of the segments of the population.

The country has little substantial physical infrastructure.  What there is was largely constructed in the 50s and 60s as part of Cold War competition between the USSR and the US.  There is very little legal or governmental infrastructure.  A commercial company investing its own or borrowed money in Afghanistan is taking a great risk of never being able  to recover its investment from the local "pirates."  Government is generally predatory in its attitude toward foreign investment funds.  I tried to find a safe haven in Afghanistan for some of my company's funds and could find none.  Senior Afghan government people would typically respond to questions about legal infrastructure with exhortations to "bring your project, all will be well."  Needless to say ...

US intervention in this place was inevitable after 9/11, but what was not necessary or wise were repeated US decisions for a COIN nation building campaign.  As this tendency began to be evident I argued for a much more limited goal in which the US would keep about 20K troops in country to maintain a government controlled enclave around Kabul and Bagram.  This would enable pursuit of located international  terrorist groups through raiding operations from that base area.  The basis for this strategy was my conclusion that the US could never "pacify" all of the territory of Afghanistan and that we would "break our teeth" trying.

I pressed this belief in various fora and with various individuals within the Obama Administration even as Obama endlessly contemplated the entreaties of the COINista generals, Petraeus, Mattis, McChrystal etc. for a country wide nation building COIN campaign.   The most interesting of these encounters was at an IQ2 debate at NYU in 2009 where I (and teammates) argued that "The US can never win in Afghanistan."  My side lost on points but the leader of the other team recently told me that he knows now that we were completely correct.  Obama gave in to the generals, and gave them the COIN war that they wanted.  I suppose that for "Barry" it was immensely flattering to have them "butter him up."

It is clear now that the COIN strategy has failed miserable and totally.  Afghanistan is not one bit more united or modernized than it has ever been.  The US has spent a sea of money there and many brave people have perished or been wrecked in chasing the idea of Afghanistan as a Central Asian Switzerland.

Trump has allowed Zalmai Khalilzad to attempt to achieve a negotiated peace with the Taliban, the former salafi takfiri, Pushtun rulers of Afghanistan, in the apparent belief that they could be "talked down out of the tree" just as his business competitors could always be talked down to meet at a "closing" table where his supposed "closing genius' would bring a DEAL.

Unfortunately this belief  in his closing talent goes unrewarded in Palestine, Syria, Turkey,Yemen, Iran, China (not yet), North Korea and Afghanistan.  IMO his difficulty in finding solutions lies in his entrapment within his own New York City business model, a model in which everything is for sale if the deal is structured skillfully to advantage the stronger party while all the while claiming that the party you are screwing is your friend.

Sadly for The Donald all those "stupid" foreigners do not understand that "everything is for sale."  Among them, the Taliban, an army and religio-political movement are notable for a lack of belief in the commercial possibilities of selling out to Donald Trump for a "mess of pottage"  or thirty pieces of silver whichever reference you prefer.  They want to win, and they want to be seen to have driven the "crusaders" from Afghanistan and in the process to have humiliated the US as the leading infidel state.  To that end they lie, prevaricate and await the day when they can crush the puny forces of "modernism" after the American departure.  Zalmai Khalilzad is an Afghan pushtun Sunni by birth and rearing.  Did he not know that they could not be trusted in dealings with the US?  I do not blame the Taliban for being what they are.  I blame all the American and NATO fools for believing that they could make the Taliban either go away or become "happy campers."  They were never going to do either of those things.  We should have known that.  Some of us did, but Americans are addicted to all the melting pot, right side of history foolishness so common in "levelled" America,

What should the US do now that the scales have fallen from Trump's eyes and the time of "good faith" negotiation with the Taliban is "dead?"  The first thing to do is to fire Khalilzad.

Last night, Col. (ret.) Douglas Macgregor told Tucker Carlson that the US should simply leave, and should have never intervened.  IOW we should get the hell out totally and forever.  This is a tempting thought.  I have wrestled with the attractiveness of the idea but there are certain problems with it.

1.  We should not want to give the jihadi movements proof of our feckless defeatability.  IMO if we leave suddenly the Afghan government and armed forces will soon collapse.  The country will then further disintegrate into a welter of jihadi factions and regional tribal strongmen, the strongest of which will be the Taliban.

2.  We have encouraged modernist Afghan men, women and girls to emerge from the shadows.  Shall we leave them to their fates under the rule of the jihadis.

3. What about all the translators, base workers and other people who have cast their lots with us.  The Taliban and other jihadis will simply kill them as apostates.  We abandoned a lot of such people in Iraq.  Will we do it again?

On balance I would say Macgregor is right that we must leave.  The time for a small remaining presence is past.  The forces in the field are too strong for a small force to maintain itself even with massive long range air support.  Think of Sir Louis Cavangnari.   No, we should leave, but we should leave on a schedule that will enable us to control the timing of our going and to protect the departure of those who wish to leave with us.  pl

BTW, SWMBO says that no mutually understood languages = no country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Louis_Napoleon_Cavagnari

Peacemaker Bolton Quits by Walrus.

It seems that another voice for peace and moderation in foreign policy has abandoned the Trump Administration. John Bolton has quit as National Security Advisor. It sounds to me like the constant calls for a more aggressive, warlike, stance from President Trump eventually became too much for this peace loving gentle flower child and he has taken a principled stand and resigned.

Who should the Administration now call on to provide some restraint on the Presidents warlike impulses?

 

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-fires-national-security-adviser-john-bolton-n1051986

 

 

John Brennan's and Jim Clappers' Last Gasp? by Larry C Johnson

A flood of news in the last 24 hours regarding Russiagate. I am referring specifically to reports that the CIA ex-filtrated Oleg Smolenkov, a mid-level Russian Foreign Ministry bureaucrat who reportedly hooked himself on the coat-tails of Yuri Ushakov, who was Ambassador to the US from 1999 through 2008. He was recruited by the CIA (i.e., asked to collect information and pass it to the U.S. Government via his or her case officer) at sometime during this period. Smolenkov is being portrayed as a supposedly "sensitive" source. But if you read either the Washington Post or New York Times accounts of this event there is not a lot of meat on this hamburger.

Regardless of the quality of his reporting, Smolenkov  is the kind of recruited source that looks good on paper and helps a CIA case officer get promoted but adds little to actual U.S. intelligence on Russia. If you understood the CIA culture you would immediately recognize that a case officer (CIA terminology for the operations officer tasked with identifying and recruiting human sources) gets rewarded by recruiting persons who ostensibly will have access to information the CIA has identified as a priority target. In this case, we're talking about possible access to Vladimir Putin.

If you take time to read both articles you will quickly see that the real purpose of this "information operation" is to paint Donald Trump as a security threat that must be stopped. This is conveniently timed to assist Jerry Nadler's mission impossible to secure Trump's impeachment. But I think there is another dynamic at play--these competing explanations for what prompted the exfiltration of this CIA asset say more about the incompetence of Barack Obama and his intel chiefs. John Brennan and Jim Clapper in particular. 

A former intelligence officer and friend summarized the various press accounts as the follows and offered his own insights in a note I received this morning:

The Michael Flynn case heats up: security clearances and a hearing to be set on exculpatory material

By Robert Willmann

The term "ex parte" appears in different contexts in the court system, and is heaviest when one side in a legal dispute meets with the judge behind closed doors without the other side being present.  On 5 September 2019, this uncommon event happened when Gen. Michael Flynn (ret.) and his new lawyers met privately with Judge Emmet Sullivan about the refusal of the federal government, through its prosecutors, to grant them security clearances to look at some existing information and exculpatory material in his criminal case, and any new material that might be disclosed. Three documents filed in Flynn's case on 30 August led to the ex parte meeting and a change in scheduling:  a joint status report which was not very joint; a Motion to Compel Production of Brady Material and for an Order to Show Cause, filed under seal; and a brief in support of the motion to compel and for a show cause order that is not sealed.

What was set as a routine status conference in federal court in Washington D.C. for Tuesday, 10 September, has now changed to one with a very significant shift:  the judge will establish a briefing schedule and a hearing date for the request (usually called a "motion") to compel the government to produce Brady material and for an order to show cause why the prosecutors involved should not be held in contempt of court.  A "brief" is a written argument filed for consideration by a court on a particular issue or issues.  It is part of a post-trial appeal to a court of appeals or to the Supreme Court, but can be unilaterally filed or ordered to be filed in a trial court.

The court's description appearing in the clerk's docket sheet says, in part--

"09/05/2019 Hearing (Ex Parte) for proceedings before Judge Emmet G. Sullivan held on 9/5/2019 as to Michael T. Flynn. The Court held an ex parte and sealed hearing with Mr. Flynn and defense counsel to consider Mr. Flynn's request for the Court's intervention on counsels request for security clearances. See Joint Status Report, ECF No. 107 at 2-3 (stating 'the government continues to deny [Mr. Flynn's] request for security clearances. [Mr. Flynn's] attempts to resolve that issue with the government have come to a dead end, thus requiring the intervention of this Court.')....  The Court advised counsel that it intends to resolve 109 Motion to Compel Production of Brady Material before addressing any Court intervention regarding security clearances for Mr. Flynns counsel."

The case and prosecution of Gen. Flynn have seemed peculiar from the start, as was his sudden resignation as National Security Advisor on 13 February 2017 after a protest against him by vice president Mike Pence.

"US extracted top spy from inside Russia in 2017" - TTG

Washington (CNN) In a previously undisclosed secret mission in 2017, the United States successfully extracted from Russia one of its highest-level covert sources inside the Russian government, multiple Trump administration officials with direct knowledge told CNN. A person directly involved in the discussions said that the removal of the Russian was driven, in part, by concerns that President Donald Trump and his administration repeatedly mishandled classified intelligence and could contribute to exposing the covert source as a spy.

The decision to carry out the extraction occurred soon after a May 2017 meeting in the Oval Office in which Trump discussed highly classified intelligence with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and then-Russian Ambassador to the US Sergey Kislyak. The intelligence, concerning ISIS in Syria, had been provided by Israel. The disclosure to the Russians by the President, though not about the Russian spy specifically, prompted intelligence officials to renew earlier discussions about the potential risk of exposure, according to the source directly involved in the matter.  (CNN)

—————

In a CNN interview, Mike Rodgers stated it was a fear of Trump’s lack of discipline about intelligence matters after his meeting with Kislyak and Lavrov in the Oval Office spurred the decision to extract the source. It was not out of fear that Trump would ever wittingly out the source. I'm glad the extraction was done before Trump's one on one meeting with Putin in Helsinki. We have no idea what he might have blurted out in that meeting.

I’m sure this is not the only concern the IC had about the security and safety of their source. When the IC assessment about Russian activities during the 2016 election came out, I was astonished with the specificity in the key findings about Putin’s plans and intentions. I thought that was putting a key source, collection capability or both in jeopardy. When the NSA only expressed moderate confidence in one of the findings about Putin’s plans and intentions, I was more convinced that it was a human asset who provided that intelligence information rather than a technical capability. That had to weigh heavily in the decision to extract the source in 2017. I was just as shocked with the specificity of the information revealed in the indictments of the IRA and especially the GRU 12. That may also have cost us some collection capabilities.

Some intelligence officers talk rather cavalierly about the dangers their sources sometimes face. They are more concerned about what the loss of a source would do to their reputation. I despise that attitude. A source’s life and liberty is in the case officer’s hands. Such trust cannot be taken lightly and should weigh heavily in the training and tasking decisions made by the case officer. Your actions could lead to the imprisonment, torture and execution of a man or woman who willingly placed their lives in your hands. It better be damned well worth it and the take better be given the care and respect it deserves.

TTG

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/09/politics/russia-us-spy-extracted/index.html

Afghanistan - Graveyard of Dreams - Republished 28 Jan 2018, Re-republished 9 September 2019

(In light of yesterday's bombing in Kabul ...)

 

We have been in Afghanistan for how long?  16 years?  It is our longest war.  How much progress have we actually made?

1.  The government that we have tried so long to nurture controls a shrinking percentage of both territory and population.

2.  How much money have we poured into the pockets of crooks of all nationalities?  In spite of that the country is severely lacking in physical, social, legal, and business infrastructure.

3.  The country's armed forces have been expanded under NATO tutelage to such a size that the small GDP will never be able to pay for them on its own.  In spite of that they are unable even to defend their own installations.

4. The country is still racked by tribal, ethnic and jihadi wars.  It has always been thus with the exception of a golden age when the last Afghan king ruled in the 50s and 60s.  How did he do that?  He did it by careful inter-ethnic diplomacy and a minimum effort to "unify"  his realm.

5.  Attacks on NATO personnel by Afghan soldiers and police continue.

6. The capital, Kabul, is not secured and is regularly attacked.

7.  The much vaunted COIN doctrine has failed there as it has failed in so many places in the world.

In spite of this the generals and the COIN nuts persist in trying to reverse Obama's policy of withdrawal from the "country" (a geographical expression really).  President Trump, who knows nothing of things military or geo-political is about to begin the process of re-introducing US combat and training forces into this blank space on the map, a space filled with hostile tribesmen and religious fanatics.  This blank space was given the dubious status of a state in the international system of states because the Russians and the British wanted to establish a buffer entity between the Tsar's empire and the Raj.

President Trump should be told that there is nothing there of real importance to the US, nothing worth more vast quantities of our money and more rivers of our blood.  Let the Afghans, Chinese, Pakistanis, Iranians and Russians deal with the chaos.  pl

China, Hong Kong and Taiwan - Frank Ching

"... pro-independence forces in Taiwan and pro-democracy forces in Hong Kong are linking up, with a growing sense that the destinies of the two territories are interwoven.

This has ignited in China deep anxiety. But Beijing should realize that it is a development that resulted largely from its own actions in Hong Kong, where over the last six or seven years it has been steadily strengthening its grip, reducing room for dissent, and even seeking to control the independent judiciary through interpretations of the Basic Law.

Such efforts continue. Only last Tuesday [Sept. 3], at its fourth press conference in a row, the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office in Beijing said that all three branches of the Hong Kong government, including the judiciary, must stand up to end the violence and restore order.

From Beijing’s perspective, it seems, the situation is dire. That same day, President Xi Jinping, in addressing party members, warned officials to be ready to “struggle against” the challenge posed by three regions: Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau, a former Portuguese colony that was returned to China in 1999.

The Communist Party is about to celebrate its 70th anniversary in power. Maybe it is time for it to realize that repression is counterproductive. It certainly isn’t the only instrument in the toolbox."  Frank Ching

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Looks like the CCP is shaken over the effects of the trade war with the US and the proto-insurgency in Hong Kong.  pl

http://www.ejinsight.com/20190909-china-the-challenges-of-hong-kong-and-taiwan/

"Study claims Google reflected 'very dramatic bias' in 2016 election search results" Dr. Robert Epstein

"Google allegedly offered search results during the 2016 election season that manipulated voters in Hillary Clinton's favor, according to researcher Dr. Robert Epstein.

The study looked into "politically oriented searches" from a "diverse group of American voters," Epstein said in an interview airing Sunday on "Life, Liberty & Levin."

"In 2016, I set up the first-ever monitoring system that allowed me to look over the shoulders of a diverse group of American voters -- there were 95 people in 24 states," he said.

"I looked at politically oriented searches that these people were conducting on Google, Bing and Yahoo. I was able to preserve more than 13,000 searches and 98,000 web pages, and I found very dramatic bias in Google's search results... favoring Hillary Clinton -- whom I supported strongly.""  Dr. Robert Epstein

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Epstein says that the amount of search result manipulation that Google conducted in 2016 could easily shift the resulting vote by several million votes.  What was it that the Dems keep saying about HC's popular vote majority?  Watch the interview.  pl

https://www.foxnews.com/media/google-bias-search-results-trump-clinton-epstein-levin

Open Thread 8 September 2019

pl

Does Trump believe what he says about Syria? - Opinion

Why does Donald Trump say the things he does about Syria and its government?

He insists that the SAG attacks its people with chemical weapons when such attacks have never been proven.  They have only been asserted by opponents of the government and in fact there exists a lot of evidence that these attacks have been staged by information operations projects like the White Helmets film production group with the surreptitious backing of a network of covert action people within the the UK government and money from USAID.

He insists that the jihadi defenders of their lodgement in Idlib Province are somehow worthy of American protection when in fact they are the same breed of salafi takfiri fanatics that he boasts of having defeated in the "caliphate."

He insists that the SAA and its allies are in the process of massacring the civilian population of Idlib Province when in fact the opposite is true.  Is it not clear that the usual blizzard of anti-government propaganda has been generated solely because the SAA is winning the day in Idlib Province?

He seems oblivious or indifferent to the fact that the Syrian Government are the protectors of the Christian and other minorities in the country.  Is he not a Christian?

His positions seem to imitate precisely the attitude of the the Israeli Likud run government and its closest US supporters like Sheldon Adelson, the casino man.  These forces have made it clear that they prefer that Syria be made into a Hobbesian maelstrom in which many small groups fight among themselves forever rather than that the present multi-confessional government should survive.

Where does Trump get such ideas?  Is it from his addiction to Fox News personalities like Jack Keane, Lou Dobbs, Brian Kilmeade and Sean Hannity?  These are people who collectively have no real understanding of the realities of the Middle East but they all have a lot of opinions seemingly based on free floating hostility toward anything in the world that does not serve their hyper-nationalism.

Is it the Turks who tell him such self serving untruths?  Is it not clear that Erdogan and company are intent on splitting off parts of Syria for future annexation?

Do CIA, DIA, State INR and the rest of the IC also feed him such nonsense?  The analysts must know the truth if they are not swept up in massive group think.  Perhaps their leaders are simply afraid to tell him the truth in the face of the opposition of people like Jared Kushner and his allies in Bolton's NSC staff.

I support many  of Trump's positions with regard to the economy, immigration and his trade struggle with China.  I may even vote for him considering the choices likely to be advanced by the Democrats but I am at a loss to understand why he claims to believe his own foolish statements about Syria.  pl

 

Tuna Steaks tonight

I've been cooking fish lately in my outside kitchen. A nice piece of halibut the other night and yellow fin tuna steaks tonight. I made a marinade of soy, teriyaki, olive oil, garlic and a little ginger. Five minutes a side on high heat and then reduced heat for another five, a glorious medium was the result. I use copper grill mats over the grates. This keeps the thing from falling apart. Suggestions for fish to grill beyond sword, tuna and halibut?  pl

Shall we oblige ourselves to fight Israel's enemies of choice?

"... Graham has been acting as a front man for both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and also for The Jewish Institute for the National Security of America (JINSA), which wrote the basic document that is being used to promote the treaty and then enlisted Graham to obtain congressional support.

Speaking to the press on a JINSA conference call, Graham said the proposed agreement would be a treaty that would protect Israel in case of an attack that constituted an “existential threat”. Citing Iran as an example, Graham said the pact would be an attempt to deter hostile neighbors like the Iranians who might use weapons of mass destruction against Israel. JINSA President Michael Makovsky elaborated on this, saying, “A mutual defense pact has a value in not only deterring but might also mitigate a retaliatory strike by an adversary of Israel, so it might mitigate an Iranian response (to an attack on its nuclear facilities).”

JINSA director of foreign policy Jonathan Ruhe added that “An Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear program would not activate this pact, but a major Iranian retaliation might. – An Israeli unilateral attack is not what the treaty covers, but rather massive Iranian retaliation is what we are addressing.”

Israel has long been reluctant to enter into any actual treaty arrangement with the United States because it might limit its options and restrain its aggressive pattern of military incursions. In that regard, the Graham-JINSA proposal is particularly dangerous as it effectively permits Israel to be interventionist with a guarantee that Washington will not seek to limit Netanyahu’s “options.” And, even though the treaty is reciprocal, there is no chance that Israel will ever be called upon to do anything to defend the United States, so it is as one-sided as most arrangements with the Jewish state tend to be."  Unz

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I was the head of DoD liaison with Israeli general staff intelligence for seven years.  During that time and in subsequent decades I have had many discussions with active and retired Israeli officers on the subject of whether or not they wanted a Defense Treaty of Alliance with the United States.  The answer is always the same.  "No."  The reason for that is simple.  A treaty is normally reciprocal and they do not want to be obliged to defend the territory or interests of the United State to whatever extent the treaty's text would require.

If JINSA wants this treaty, then the Jewish Agency and the Israeli government want it.  Why do they want it?   IMO the answer is hidden in plain sight in the text of the "floated" document.   The treaty would be activated in the event of physical attacks on Israel but also in the event of PERCEIVED existential threats. 

IOW, if the Israelis were to claim that they feared an onslaught  by Syria and Hizbullah they could legally claim that the US is obligated to go to war against Syria and Hizbullah.

What a good deal for Israel!  Not only would they continue to receive the present river of largess in defense grants and credits but they would also under the treaty have the means with which to order the US armed forces into action against their enemies of choice whenever they wished to do so.

pl

http://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/lindsey-grahams-blank-check-why-a-defense-agreement-with-israel-would-be-a-disaster-for-americans/