Mossad Archives - The Automatic Earth

The Trump administration slapped 25% tariffs on French wine, Italian cheese and single-malt Scotch whisky — but spared Italian wine, pasta and olive oil — in retaliation for European Union subsidies on large aircraft. The U.S. Trade Representative’s Office released a list of hundreds of European products that will get new tariffs, including cookies, salami, butter and yogurt – but in many cases applied to only some EU countries, including German camera parts and blankets produced in the United Kingdom. The list includes UK-made sweaters, pullovers, cashmere items and wool clothing, as well as olives from France and Spain, EU-produced pork sausage and other pork products other than ham, and German coffee. The new tariffs are to take effect as early as Oct. 18.

The U.S. Trade Representative’s Office said it would “continually re-evaluate these tariffs based on our discussions with the EU” and expects to enter talks in a bid to resolve the dispute. Still some Italian foods — Parmesan Reggiano, Romano and provolone cheese — were hit with tariffs as were Italian fruits, clams and yogurt. Also getting new tariffs are German and British camera parts, industrial microwave ovens, printed books, sweet biscuits and waffles. The main target of the U.S. tariffs is Airbus aircraft made in the EU, which face a 10% levy that could hurt U.S. airlines such as Delta that have billions of dollars of Airbus orders waiting to be filled. EU products winning reprieves include chocolate, Greek, French and Portuguese olive oil, helicopters, frozen fish, lobster, sparkling wine, stemware and tiles.

“I’d go a step further – I think he probably helped write” the complaint..”

• NYT: ‘Whistleblower’ Spoke To ‘Shifty Schiff’ Before Filing Complaint (RT)

The CIA agent accusing President Donald Trump of a quid pro quo with Ukraine spoke to House intel chief Adam Schiff’s staff before filing his whistleblower complaint, sources say – and Trump believes the collusion goes deeper. The “whistleblower” spoke to a House Intelligence Committee staffer about his concerns, gleaned from secondhand knowledge of a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, that the president was abusing his power – and that staffer shared the information with Schiff – before the still-anonymous CIA officer filed his complaint, according to the New York Times, which cited Schiff’s spokesman and “current and former American officials” in a report published Wednesday.

The Times’ report “shows that Schiff is a fraud,” the president told reporters during a White House press conference with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto Wednesday afternoon when he was asked about the story, calling the fact that the congressman, whom he dubbed “shifty Schiff,” knew about the complaint before it was even filed “a scandal.” “I’d go a step further – I think he probably helped write” the complaint, Trump said. “He knew long before, and he helped write it too,” he continued more confidently. The president – who elsewhere in his remarks tried out his new “corrupt news” moniker for the mainstream media – nevertheless congratulated the Times on the scoop. “Maybe they’re getting better,” he mused.

“They should look at him for treason because he is making up the words of the president of the United States – not only the words but the meaning..”

• Trump Attacks Democrats, Whistleblower Over Impeachment (R.)

U.S. President Donald Trump kept up his assaults on the Democratic lawmakers leading impeachment proceedings on Wednesday, accusing House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff of treason, as well as attacking the unidentified whistleblower who reported concerns about his behavior. The Republican president has lashed out repeatedly at the impeachment inquiry, which was prompted by his phone call with the Ukrainian president that sought an investigation that would be damaging to a Democratic political opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump repeatedly says he did nothing wrong in his July 25 telephone call in which he asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate a domestic political rival Joe Biden, the former U.S. vice president.

He has repeatedly attacked the Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, who is leading the impeachment inquiry. “They should look at him for treason because he is making up the words of the president of the United States – not only the words but the meaning,” Trump said. He accused the Democrats’ impeachment efforts of being groundless and politically motivated. “They’ve been trying to impeach me from the day I got elected,” Trump said.

Both sides are now timing for the 2020 elections.

• Lindsey Graham Urges Foreign Leaders To Assist Barr With Investigation (Pol.)

Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham on Wednesday asked several foreign leaders to continue to assist Attorney General William Barr with his investigation into the 2016 election. In a letter to the prime ministers of Australia, Italy and Britain, the South Carolina Republican requested their “continued cooperation with Attorney General Barr as the Department of Justice continues to investigate the origins and extent of foreign influence in the 2016 election.” At President Donald Trump’s urging, Barr is examining how the FBI investigation into connections between Russia and the Trump campaign began. Graham stated in the letter that during the 2016 election, the U.S. law enforcement and intelligence communities used a “deeply flawed dossier filled with hearsay and written by a biased, former United Kingdom intelligence officer” — a reference to the so-called Steele dossier — as part of its investigation.

He also added that law enforcement had received “intelligence from an Italian ‘professor’” — referring to Joseph Mifsud, whose interactions with a former Trump campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, prompted the FBI to open its counterintelligence investigation — and accepted information from an Australian diplomat. That was a reference to a reported tip from an Australian official, Alexander Downer, to the FBI about possible collusion between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign. [..] “That the Attorney General is holding meetings with your countries to aid in the Justice Department’s investigation of what happened is well within the bounds of his normal activities,” Graham wrote. “He is simply doing his job.”

Exposing the sheer stupidity that controls America.

• We’ll “Definitely” Interfere In 2020, Just “Don’t Tell Anybody” – Putin (ZH)

Absolutely no laughing matter for the likes of Rachel Maddow and others who have now spent years locked deep in their ‘Russiagate’ navel-gazing, but at least Putin still hasn’t lost his sense of humor about it. While speaking on a panel of industry and political leaders at the Russian Energy Week conference, Putin mocked reports already alleging Moscow plans to interfere in the 2020 US presidential election. When pressed by NBC News correspondent Keir Simmons over whether former Special Counsel Robert Mueller was accurate in predicting Russia would “attempt to interfere” in the 2020 election, Putin leaned forward in a gesture to act like he was whispering a ‘secret’: “I’m going to tell you a secret,” Putin said, leaning forward. “Yes, we will definitely intervene, don’t tell anybody” he continued to an applauding crowd.

“You know, we have enough of our own problems,” Putin continued. “We are engaged in resolving internal problems and are primarily focused on this.” His characteristic public sarcasm was a hit with the crowd, at an event which included OPEC Secretary General Mohammed Barkindo and others. He followed on a more serious note by calling it “ridiculous” that Russia would interfere in the 2020 election. He also talked down his relationship and interactions with President Trump, describing that the two leaders have never been close. “In my opinion, we have good, businesslike relations, and a relatively stable level of trust,” he said during the conference’s plenary session. “We’ve never been close, and aren’t now.” However, Putin did come to the US president’s defense when asked about the Ukraine call transcript.

“From what we know, I don’t see anything compromising at all,” Putin told the audience. “I didn’t see that during this phone call Trump demanded compromising material from Zelenskiy at any cost and threatened him that he wouldn’t help Ukraine.” The Kremlin last week said its consent must be required before any calls between the US and Russian leader are published. Putin said there’s no compromising material at all in those transcripts, and added he that “any conversation can be published — I always proceed from that.” Putin also addressed last year’s controversy over his closed door summit with President Trump, saying he requested that Washington publish details of the talks. “We don’t mind,” Putin said confidently. “I assure you that there’s nothing there that would compromise President Trump.”

I wouldn’t have said he shames her. He simply understands that Greta IS her PR handlers. She should go home and be a child, not get dragged around the planet by spin doctors.

• Putin Shames Greta Thunberg And Her Handlers Over Environmental Agenda (ZH)

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday chided Swedish environmentalist Greta Thunberg and her adult handlers, after the 16-year-old gave an emotional speech at the UN late last month. “Sure, Greta is kind, but emotions should not control this issue,” said Putin. “Go and explain to developing countries why they should continue living in poverty and not be like Sweden,” he added, before saying that it was deplorable how some groups are using Thunberg to achieve their own goals. In her speech last week, Thunberg lashed out at the United Nations – saying “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.” Thunberg also filed a legal complaint accusing five countries of inaction on global warming – drawing the ire of French President Emmanuel Macron, and many others who noted that she’s left China out of her diatribes and lawsuit, despite being the world’s worst polluter by total volume.

There are actually Labour MPs who support Johnson’s nothingness.

• Dismay In Brussels As Boris Johnson Finally Reveals Brexit Plan (G.)

Boris Johnson appears to be fighting a losing battle to avoid Britain staying in the European Union beyond 31 October after Michel Barnier privately gave a scathing analysis of the prime minister’s new plan for the Irish border, describing it as a trap. The European commission also refused to go into the secretive and intensive “tunnel” talks with the UK’s negotiators before a crunch summit on 17 October from which the UK had hoped to deliver a breakthrough deal. Despite concerted attempts to avoid publicly trashing the UK proposals, there was dismay behind the scenes in Brussels after Johnson tabled his first concrete proposal for replacing the Irish backstop.

The prime minister had set out the outline of the government’s offer in a speech to Tory party faithful in Manchester that also laid down the battle lines for a general election. On Wednesday night, he was hopeful a parliamentary majority could be assembled to back it. Johnson’s plan involves Northern Ireland leaving the EU’s customs union at the end of transition along with the rest of the UK, necessitating checks and controls on the island of Ireland. Northern Ireland would also stay aligned with EU standards on goods if Stormont agreed by December 2020, the end of the transition period, and then in a vote every four years.

But the UK has also requested that both sides commit at treaty level “never to conduct checks at the border” even if Stormont vetoes the arrangements laid out in the new 44-page Irish protocol. Barnier said that this commitment would prevent Brussels from protecting its internal market if the Northern Ireland assembly blocked the arrangement in 2020 or at a later date. “The EU would then be trapped with no backstop to preserve the single market after Brexit,” he warned, according to someone present in the room.

Federico Pieraccini on an attack that proves it wasn’t Iran, ever. Where’s the coverage of this in the western press? Too inconvenient?

“Let us salute the resourceful Houthis, today’s unconquerable underdogs, for giving the world’s most repugnant bullies a bloody nose, and a huge blow to their bloated egos.”

• 3 Saudi Brigades Annihilated in Houthi Offensive in Saudi Arabia (Pieraccini)

Many may have hitherto been led to believe that the Houthis were a ragtag armed force lacking in sophistication. Many, seeing the drone and missile attacks on Saudi oil plants, may have declared it to be a false-flag attack carried out by Riyadh to boost Aramco’s market value; either that or it was an operation carried out by Iran or even Israel. On Saturday September 28, the Houthis put paid to such speculation by confirming what many, like myself, have been writing for months; that is, that the asymmetrical tactics of the Houthis, combined with the conventional capabilities of the Yemeni army, are capable of bringing the Saudi kingdom of Mohammed Bin Salman to its knees.

The Yemeni army’s missile forces are able to carry out highly complex attacks, no doubt as a result of reconnaissance provided by the local Shia population within the Kingdom that is against the House of Saud’s dictatorship. These Houthi sympathisers within Saudi Arabia helped in target identification, carried out reconnaissance within the plants, found the most vulnerable and impactful points, and passed this intelligence on to the Houthis and Yemeni army. These Yemeni forces employed locally produced means to severely degrade Saudi Arabia’s crude-oil-extraction and processing plants. The deadly strikes halved oil production and threatened to continue with other targets if the Saudi-conducted genocide in Yemen did not stop.

On Saturday 29 the Houthis and the Yemeni army conducted an incredible conventional attack lasting three days that began from within Yemen’s borders. The operation would have involved months of intelligence gathering and operational planning. It was a far more complex attack than that conducted against Aramco’s oil facilities. Initial reports indicate that the forces of the Saudi-led coalition were lured into vulnerable positions and then, through a pincer movement conducted quickly within Saudi territory, the Houthis surrounded the town of Najran and its outskirts and got the better of three Saudi brigades numbering in the thousands and including dozens of senior officers as well as numerous combat vehicles. This event is a game changer, leaving the US, Mike Pompeo and the Israelis and Saudis unable to lay the blame on Iran as all this took place a long way from Iran.

Whitney Webb strikes again.

• Ex-Israeli Intel Exec Says Epstein, Ghislaine Worked for Israeli Intel (Webb)

In an interview with Zev Shalev, former CBS News executive producer and award-winning investigative journalist for Narativ, the former senior executive for Israel’s Directorate of Military Intelligence, Ari Ben-Menashe, claimed not only to have met Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged madam, Ghislaine Maxwell, back in the 1980s, but that both Epstein and Maxwell were already working with Israeli intelligence during that time period. In an interview last week with the independent outlet Narativ, Ben-Menashe, who himself was involved in Iran-Contra arms deals, told his interviewer Zev Shalev that he had been introduced to Jeffrey Epstein by Robert Maxwell in the mid-1980s while Maxwell’s and Ben-Menashe’s involvement with Iran-Contra was ongoing. Ben-Menashe did not specify the year he met Epstein.

Ben-Menashe told Shalev that “he [Maxwell] wanted us to accept him [Epstein] as part of our group …. I’m not denying that we were at the time a group that it was Nick Davies [Foreign Editor of the Maxwell-Owned Daily Mirror], it was Maxwell, it was myself and our team from Israel, we were doing what we were doing.” Past reporting by Seymour Hersh and others revealed that Maxwell, Davies and Ben-Menashe were involved in the transfer and sale of military equipment and weapons from Israel to Iran on behalf of Israeli intelligence during this time period. He then added that Maxwell had stated during the introduction that “your Israeli bosses have already approved” of Epstein. Shalev later noted that Maxwell “had an extensive network in Israel at the time, which included the then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, according to Ben-Menashe.”

Ben-Menashe went on to say that he had “met him [Epstein] a few times in Maxwell’s office, that was it.” He also said he was not aware of Epstein being involved in arms deals for anyone else he knew at the time, but that Maxwell wanted to involve Epstein in the arms transfer in which he, Davies and Ben-Menashe were engaged on Israel’s behalf.

“These inconsistencies should raise serious doubts as to whether the British justice system is operating objectively and according to domestic and international legal norms.”

We had no such doubts any more.

• Julian Assange, Britain’s Unconvicted Prisoner (Cross)

This article is a second piece focusing on Belmarsh prison, where the founder of Wikileaks, Julian Assange, continues to be arbitrarily detained by the British government. The first part showed how Belmarsh prison has been systematically denying Assange access to justice by restricting all the means through which he could prepare his defence; access to and possession of legal documents, talking to his US lawyers, restricted meetings with his UK lawyers, and access to a laptop as a basic means to prepare his defence. These restrictions have been imposed in contradiction to all legislation and standards regarding the rights of the prisoner. This piece looks at the weaponizing of Category A prison security and the use of prison healthcare isolation as part of a program of the state-sponsored abuse of a journalist imprisoned for releasing prima facie evidence of US war crimes committed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The decision on 13th September by Judge Vanessa Baraitser in a ‘technical hearing‘ at Westminster Magistrate’s Court, means that although Assange has been given parole half way through what experts believe was a disproportionate 50 week sentence for skipping police bail in 2012, he will still be kept in prison while he is fighting extradition to the US – a process which could take many years. Baraitser justified her decision as follows: “In my view I have substantial ground for believing if I release you, you will abscond again” She described his status now as: “…from a serving prisoner to a person facing extradition”

According to the British judiciary, Assange was initially apprehended and sentenced to prison because he had ‘skipped bail’ by seeking refuge for political asylum in London’s Ecuadorian embassy. Despite the fact the original investigation in which he was wanted for questioning (and complied) by Swedish authorities had been dropped, the British courts still treated Assange as a serious criminal and sentenced him as such. The narratives in Baraitser’s statement, the injustices arising from them and the proceedings around this hearing have all been highlighted and roundly condemned. What’s more, despite the change to Assange’s prisoner status, he has so far been kept in Belmarsh. These inconsistencies should raise serious doubts as to whether the British justice system is operating objectively and according to domestic and international legal norms.

Debt Rattle September 7 2019

Sep 072019

September 7, 2019 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:47 am Finance Tagged with: Boeing, Boris, Brexit, CIA, crackup, Epstein, financialization, martyr, MIT, Mossad, Powell, Snowden, tariffs 13 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Portrait of Dora Maar 1942

• The Financialization of the US Economy (WS)

• Fed Chair Powell Repeats Vow To Act ‘As Appropriate’ (R.)

• Tariffs Are No Longer China’s Biggest Problem In The Trade War (CNBC)

• Boris Johnson Urged To Become A ‘Brexit Martyr’ (DM)

• A Trump Brexit Threatens (Wight)

• A Crackup Is Inevitable (Kunstler)

• CIA, Mossad, “the Epstein Network” and an Orwellian Nightmare (Whitney Webb)

• How MIT Concealed Its Relationship with Jeffrey Epstein (Farrow)

• Boeing’s Chief Technical Pilot On The 737 MAX Project Pleads The Fifth (ST)

• For The First Time In My Life, I’m Frightened To Be Jewish (David Graeber)

• Edward Snowden’s Guardian Angels (F24)

But services don’t make stuff.

• The Financialization of the US Economy (WS)

Service-producing industries dominate the US economy, accounting for over 70% of GDP. And this sector is hopping. Revenues in the major services categories rose 5.3% in the second quarter of 2019, compared to the same quarter a year earlier, to $4.05 trillion, not seasonally adjusted, according to the Commerce Department’s Quarterly Selected Services Estimates released today. For the first two quarters of 2019, service revenues rose 5.5% to $8.0 trillion. The pace of growth so far this year is slightly lower than the hot 6.0% growth for the year 2018.

Four biggies dominate the service sector, and the US economy overall. They accounted for $2.92 trillion in revenues in Q1, or about 72% of total service revenues, with the biggest of them all, finance and insurance, accounting for 32%, up from 31% at the end of last year. It is also the fastest-growing segment, even faster than healthcare, as the US economy is getting more and more financialized. The share of each of the big four of overall service revenues: • Finance and insurance: 32% • Healthcare: 17% • Professional, scientific, and technical services: 12% • “Information” services, such as telecommunications, software, and data processing: 11%.

Only one act is appropriate: go home. Did you know Jay Powell is worth some $100 million? Do you think he’s concerned about Americans living paycheck to paycheck?

• Fed Chair Powell Repeats Vow To Act ‘As Appropriate’ (R.)

The U.S. Federal Reserve will continue to act “as appropriate” to sustain the economic expansion in the world’s biggest economy, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said Friday in Zurich, sticking to a phrase that financial markets have read as signaling further interest-rate reductions ahead. “Our obligation is to use our tools to support the economy, and that’s what we’ll continue to do,” Powell said at the University of Zurich. Still, he said, “We are clearly at a time where there is a range of views” among Fed policymakers meeting Sept. 17-18 to decide on rates.

Powell’s careful wording reflects a split within the U.S. central bank about how best to respond to an economy where the job market and consumer spending are strong but rising trade tensions between Beijing and Washington, Britain’s possibly messy exit from the European Union, and a broad global slowdown pose risks. Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren for instance has made the case for leaving rates where they are until those risks are more tangible in the economic data. Others including St. Louis Fed President James Bullard have called for a half-a-percentage point interest-rate cut to get ahead of the trade war risks and bring the Fed’s policy rate more in line with market expectations. Meanwhile, financial markets are betting Fed policymakers will agree to split the difference and follow their quarter-point rate cut in July with another one later this month.

Decoupling.

• Tariffs Are No Longer China’s Biggest Problem In The Trade War (CNBC)

It’s not the new round of tariffs that went into effect; we’ve been playing the tit-for-tat tariff war for more than a year. It’s not the economic reports; they’ve been a little too mixed lately to force any dramatic moves. It’s not even the decision by Hong Kong administrator Carrie Lam to fully withdraw the controversial mainland extradition bill; it’s still not clear that the Hong Kong unrest would be affected in any way by a trade deal. Given the timing of the change in tone, it seems more likely that what’s making the difference is a realization on both sides that there’s another way this trade war could end – and that possible ending is one the U.S. is very unlikely to lose.

That alternate ending is summed up in one word: decoupling. The decoupling push is quite different than any U.S. efforts to get China to open up more of its economy to American companies. Instead, it focuses on reducing America’s extremely heavy reliance on China for so much of its manufacturing needs. Even if China’s economy weren’t so closed off to so many American goods and services, a strong argument has long been made that the U.S. needs to diversify its sources for imports. While finding those new sources wouldn’t necessarily do anything to dent America’s trade imbalances, it would reduce the risks of a major disruption to the U.S. economy based on disputes or other problems connected to a single foreign country.

As I wrote yesterday, he has little to lose by resigning.

• Boris Johnson Urged To Become A ‘Brexit Martyr’ (DM)

Boris Johnson wrote to all Tory members last night to indicate that he would rather defy the law than beg Brussels for a delay in bringing Britain out of the EU. The Prime Minister said he was only bound ‘in theory’ by a law which is expected to receive Royal Assent on Monday, taking a No Deal Brexit off the table. In his letter, he reiterated his determination to stand firm against Remainers, saying: ‘They just passed a law that would force me to beg Brussels for an extension to the Brexit deadline. This is something I will never do.’ Earlier on Friday he told reporters he would not entertain seeking another deadline extension from Brussels, as the incoming law compels him to do if no agreement is in place by October 19.

He was urged last night by Tory grandee Iain Duncan Smith to hold his nerve, saying he would be ‘martyred’ if he chose to break the law and risk a possible prison sentence for contempt of Parliament. Mr Duncan Smith told The Telegraph: ‘This is about Parliament versus the people. Boris Johnson is on the side of the people, who voted to leave the EU. ‘The people are sovereign because they elect Parliament. But Parliament wants to stop the will of the people.’ If Mr Johnson fails to carry out the will of Parliament, he risks being taken to court and, if a judge ordered him to obey Parliament, he could be held in contempt and even jailed for refusing.

Mr Johnson’s latest plans for a snap election appeared to have been scuppered yet again last night by a ’stitch-up’ between Jeremy Corbyn and Remain parties. Labour, the Lib Dems and Scots and Welsh nationalists agreed to block the public going to the polls before October 31. It leaves the Prime Minister in limbo, forced to choose between resigning or defying a law passed by MPs ruling out a No Deal Brexit.

“This desire for godlike powers of total creation is precisely why free market ideologues are so drawn to crises and disasters.”

• A Trump Brexit Threatens (Wight)

Trump’s otherworldly vice president, Mike Pence, has just said more in one short sentence to unravel the complexities of the Brexit crisis that continues to bedevil the UK, than the ocean of column inches that have been devoted to the subject since the referendum was held in 2016. Speaking at a black tie event in London on Thursday night, attended by an array of business executives, Pence proclaimed, “The minute the UK is out, America is in.” Pence, a man who stands as living proof that human evolution is not wedded to an ever upwards path, delivered these words with the bombast of a Roman proconsul addressing the notables of a soon-to-be client state.

Thus let there be no doubt that the hard no-deal Brexit advocated by the UK’s newly installed Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his supporters is to all intents a Trump Brexit – one that will see the UK economy opened up to the tender mercies of U.S. corporations on terms set not by London but Washington. In other words, we’re talking disaster capitalism on steroids, bringing with it the likely prospect of the decimation of what’s left of the UK’s welfare state, including that most revered totem to social solidarity, the National Health Service (NHS), which since the end of WWII, when it was established, has provided generations of British citizens with free healthcare at the point of need, funded out of general taxation, regardless of social class or personal wealth.

The NHS is therefore a socialist institution in all but name, which Johnson and his privileged right wing establishment acolytes in the hard Brexit camp would sooner see broken up and sold off to U.S. insurance companies in sacrifice to their god, the market. This is regardless of any and all assurances given to the contrary. In her classic work, Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein writes: “Believers in the shock doctrine [of disaster capitalism] are convinced that only a great rupture – a flood, a war, a terrorist attack – can generate the kind of vast, clean canvases they crave,” while earlier in the same passage, warning that “This desire for godlike powers of total creation is precisely why free market ideologues are so drawn to crises and disasters.”

National sovereignty.

• A Crackup Is Inevitable (Kunstler)

What’s at stake behind all the pushing-and-shoving is the question of national sovereignty. Does it matter anymore? I suspect it will matter increasingly for everyone in many nations, and at a smaller and smaller scale of political divisions so that, for instance, Great Britain itself will be faced with surrendering its dominion over Scotland and Northern Ireland. This is churning in the zeitgeist now, actually has been for some time since the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia cracked up. Even the United States finds itself increasingly disunited and it’s not inconceivable that before the century ends some regions may go their own way. Texans have been talking it up for years, and California is already acting like she’s started divorce proceedings.

China, meanwhile, is whipping its quasi-vassal Hong Kong like a dog because Xi Jinping is not in a position to bust Donald Trump upside the head and Xi’s got to take it out on somebody. Everything was looking so rosy for China as it burst out of its medieval cocoon into industrial adulthood, and now Mr. Trump is ruining the global arrangements that turned the sclerotic old outfit into a global super-dragon. They’ve had a blast driving down the capitalist road — even if they’re actually ruled by communists — but a storm of bad debt is coming up on them from behind, and if it catches up, the joyride is over and some kind of dreadful crackup happens.

All the abiding normality of the past seventy years is slipping away into flux. Modernity is finally yielding – to what? Nobody knows. And nowhere is this more obvious than in the realm of money and economy. Beyond all the other quarrels of modern times — democracy versus communism, Islam versus the West, the wealthy north versus the poor south — one thing remained pretty steady: the flow of oil into the engines of economy. Turned out, the world didn’t have to run out of oil for that normality to fray badly; the oil just had to become marginally unaffordable, and voila! It’s hard for people to grok, especially here in the USA with oil production so far above the old 1970 prior peak that the proposition seems absurd.

Whitney’s latest. Obvious must read.

• CIA, Mossad, “the Epstein Network” and an Orwellian Nightmare (Whitney Webb)

Prior to the public scrutiny of Barak’s relationship to Jeffrey Epstein, following the latter’s arrest this past July and subsequent death, Barak had come under fire for his ties to disgraced film mogul Harvey Weinstein. Indeed, it was Ehud Barak who put Weinstein in contact with the Israeli private intelligence outfit Black Cube, which employs former Mossad agents and Israeli military intelligence operatives, as Weinstein sought to intimidate the women who had accused him of sexual assault and sexual harassment. Former Mossad director Meir Dagan led Black Cube’s board until his death in 2016 and Carbyne co-founder Lital Leshem is Black Cube’s former director of marketing.

After Barak put him in contact with Black Cube’s leadership, Weinstein, according to The New Yorker, used the private spy firm to “‘target,’ or collect information on, dozens of individuals, and compile psychological profiles that sometimes focused on their personal or sexual histories.” In addition, The New Yorker noted that “Weinstein monitored the progress of the investigations personally” and “also enlisted former employees from his film enterprises to join in the effort, collecting names and placing calls that, according to some sources who received them, felt intimidating.”

Yet, more recently, it has been Barak’s close relationship to Epstein that has raised eyebrows and opened him up to political attacks from his rivals. Epstein and Barak were first introduced by former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres in 2002, a time when Epstein’s pedophile blackmail and sex trafficking operation was in full swing.

Pecunia non olet.

• How MIT Concealed Its Relationship with Jeffrey Epstein (Farrow)

The M.I.T. Media Lab, which has been embroiled in a scandal over accepting donations from the financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, had a deeper fund-raising relationship with Epstein than it has previously acknowledged, and it attempted to conceal the extent of its contacts with him. Dozens of pages of e-mails and other documents obtained by The New Yorker reveal that, although Epstein was listed as “disqualified” in M.I.T.’s official donor database, the Media Lab continued to accept gifts from him, consulted him about the use of the funds, and, by marking his contributions as anonymous, avoided disclosing their full extent, both publicly and within the university.

Perhaps most notably, Epstein appeared to serve as an intermediary between the lab and other wealthy donors, soliciting millions of dollars in donations from individuals and organizations, including the technologist and philanthropist Bill Gates and the investor Leon Black. According to the records obtained by The New Yorker and accounts from current and former faculty and staff of the media lab, Epstein was credited with securing at least $7.5 million in donations for the lab, including two million dollars from Gates and $5.5 million from Black, gifts the e-mails describe as “directed” by Epstein or made at his behest. The effort to conceal the lab’s contact with Epstein was so widely known that some staff in the office of the lab’s director, Joi Ito, referred to Epstein as Voldemort or “he who must not be named.”

By refusing to send documents.

• Boeing’s Chief Technical Pilot On The 737 MAX Project Pleads The Fifth (ST)

A former Boeing official who played a key role in the development of the 737 MAX has refused to provide documents sought by federal prosecutors investigating two fatal crashes of the jetliner, citing his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, according to a person familiar with the matter. Mark Forkner, Boeing’s chief technical pilot on the MAX project, invoked the privilege in response to a grand jury subpoena issued by U.S. Justice Department prosecutors looking into the design and certification of the plane, the person said.

Invoking the Fifth to avoid testifying, while a legal right, is sometimes interpreted as an admission of guilt. Its use to resist a subpoena for documents is less common and may only imply a dance between prosecutors and defense attorneys, legal experts say. Forkner, now a first officer for Southwest Airlines, referred questions to his attorney when reached by phone. His attorney, David Gerger, of Houston, did not respond to inquiries.

Forkner, who worked at Boeing from 2011 to 2018, according to his LinkedIn profile, was frequently anxious about the deadlines and pressures faced in the MAX program, going to some of his peers in the piloting world for help, a person who worked on the project previously told The Seattle Times, speaking on condition of anonymity. The MCAS system, designed to move a powerful control surface at the tail to push the airplane’s nose down in certain rare situations, played a critical role in the crashes when the planes nose-dived out of the sky. During the certification process, Forkner suggested to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that MCAS not be included in the pilot manual, according to previous Seattle Times reporting.

The anti-Corbyn campaign fallout.

• For The First Time In My Life, I’m Frightened To Be Jewish (David Graeber)

I am 58 years old, and for the first time in my life, I am frightened to be Jewish. We live in a time when racism is being normalized, when Nazis parade in the streets in Europe and America; Jew baiters like Hungary’s Orban are treated as respectable players on the international scene, “white nationalist” propagandist Steve Bannon can openly coordinate scare-mongering tactics with Boris Johnson in London at the same time as in Pittsburg, murderers deluded by white nationalist propaganda are literally mowing Jews down with automatic weapons. How is it, then, that our political class has come to a consensus that the greatest threat to Britain’s Jewish community is a lifelong anti-racist accused of not being assiduous enough in disciplining party members who make offensive comments on the internet?

For almost all my Jewish friends, this is what is currently creating the greatest and most immediate sense of trepidation, even more than the actual Nazis: the apparently endless campaign by politicians like Margaret Hodge, Wes Streeting, and Tom Watson to weaponize antisemitism accusations against the current leadership of the Labour party. It is a campaign – which however it started, has been sustained primarily by people who are not themselves Jewish – so cynical and irresponsible that I genuinely believe it to be a form of antisemitism in itself. And it is a clear and present danger to Jewish people. To any of these politicians who may be reading this, I am begging you: if you really do care about Jews, please, stop this.

Justin better act.

• Edward Snowden’s Guardian Angels (F24)

After he revealed the National Security Agency’s illegal mass surveillance programmes in 2013, Edward Snowden received help from some unlikely accomplices. Four refugees and their lawyer allowed the whistleblower to escape and stay under the radar, at a time when he was the world’s most wanted man. For 13 days, they sheltered him in their tiny apartments located in the poorest area of Hong Kong, home to the marginalised community of asylum seekers. The mastermind behind the idea of hiding the American fugitive in plain sight was Robert Tibbo, a Canadian human rights lawyer, well known for defending asylum seekers in the region.

Snowden told FRANCE 24 he believes he owes his life to these unexpected allies, who could have turned him in at any time: “They could have written an email to the CIA and they could have gotten a big cheque or they could have finally gotten asylum in exchange. But they would have had to do it by selling someone into a grave. And for that, I’ll never be able to repay them.”

But since their identity was revealed, especially with the release of the Oliver Stone film “Snowden” in 2016, these refugees are being persecuted by Hong Kong authorities. Arrested on several occasions, they have been questioned about their ties with Snowden. The little welfare they received from the government has been cut. Today, they all live in constant fear in Hong Kong. If deported to their home country of Sri Lanka, they could face imprisonment, torture and even death. All of them have applied for asylum in Canada.

How Long is Jeffrey Epstein For This World?

Jul 192019

July 19, 2019 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 6:52 pm Primers Tagged with: CIA, Epstein, Giuffre, inmates, Judge Berman, Manhattan, Mossad, predator, Prince Andrew, sheikhs, State Dept, videos 5 Responses »

Gustave Moreau Helen on the Walls of Troy 1885

First of all, I dearly wish I never had to read or write about Jeffrey Epstein again. But I can’t. And going over the reports about him, and watching the videos below (I’m sure there’s a thousand more), I started thinking I don’t see how he can have much longer to live. (Note as always that if you receive this through email, the videos may not show properly. If someone can explain why, and what to do about that, I’m game. Meanwhile, please go to the TAE site.)

There are three main threats to Jeffrey Epstein’s life (or four, if you include his victims). No. 1 is his fellow inmates in the Manhattan MCC. He’ll be in very strict isolation, because inmates and pedophilia is a very explosive combination. So isolation, but that’s never 100%.

And Judge Berman yesterday ordered him in jail until his trial(s), instead of in his $77 million Manhattan mansion not far from that same prison, so he’ll be there a while; that trial could take a very long time to happen, even years. All the more chance for an inmate to make an easy $1000 by offing him.

The no. 2 threat is Epstein himself. Berman’s decision means he’s very unlikely to ever get out again. Chances of him being declared innocent are as close to zero as as anything Kelvin. So why would he want to continue to live? Perhaps his lawyers try and tell him he’s always got a shot, and there’s always a next court date, but he doesn’t strike me as fully delusional.

I could be wrong, sure, about much of all this, but I don’t think so. The no. 3 threat is, obviously, the people he might “sing” about. And that’s an litany of the world’s who’s who. No doubt the FBI may already have their IDs and photos and what-not, but why chance it when you can take down the -potential- crown witness?

Now, if we may believe just 10% of what George Webb talks about in the last video in this article, everybody who’s anybody in government, secret services et al in the whole wide world should feel threatened right now. But those 2,000 pages from 2015 that Judge Berman ordered to be unsealed are not yet public, and you can bet your donkey that the cream of the global lawyer and secret service crop are going over them as you read this.

Will we ever know what Epstein really did? The odds are not in favor of that. But let’s try and have a look anyway. See if we can -to an extent- make up our minds based on that.

First up, an interview with Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of Epstein’s main accusers. And Ghislaine Maxwell’s, don’t let’s forget that. She’s still walking around free, amazingly.

This is a Miami Herald video linked to Julie K. Brown’s series for the Miami Herald last fall on Epstein. It was posted to YouTube by the Miami Herald on Nov 30, 2018. It took another 8 months for him to be arrested. The 2,000 pages “supposed” to be unsealed soon stem from a case Roberts Giuffre brought in 2015.

Fast forward to the present, this is from RT on July 18, tackling the fact that Judge Berman refused to let Epstein out on bail. It’s not all the greatest stuff, but you DO get the feeling.

This I found interesting, Fox, also from July 18, because it targets Prince Andrew. Is MI6 going to be able to muffle away the obviously very strong and long-term connection between Epstein and Andrew? I’m thinking they’d probably have to get those 2,000 pages re-sealed. Or, you know, burned down. Nuked.

And then there’s George Webb. Now he is, I understand, someone who’s known as a conspiracy theorist, but then many people are in some circles, including myself, This video was posted on July 8 2019, 2 days after Epstein’s arrest. My thought while watching this is he may be wrong on some things, he may even be making a few points up, but when you’re that detailed on events that occurred over such a long time, you’re either on very powerful drugs or you’re not entirely wrong. Check for yourself.

To summarize my thoughts on this, and the reason I started writing this, I can’t see Epstein living much longer. There are too many people who would rather see him dead, including perhaps himself. And there are very few people who want him to get into lengthy talks with prosecutors who are actually looking for the truth.

Now of course we must wonder if any prosecutor wants that truth. Alex Acosta left his US government job because “Epstein is intelligence” was not enough to let him keep his job. And if we can believe some of the stories about the CIA, the State Dept and Mossad being linked to Epstein (and we got worse than that), it looks like he’s just got to go. Unless someone, or some party involved, has a reason to protect him against all odds. If only to handicap some other people.

After this piece I really hope I never have to write about this topic again. My hopes of that are not overly high, but I do have to say I have a very hard time thinking about child -sex- abuse. I also think we must think much harder about why it is that we pick predators to lead our societies. Because this hardly ever fails, doesn’t it? A bunch of sexual deviants rise to the top everywhere.

Sexual predation appears to be some inevitable part of political power. Not everywhere and not all the time, but far too much for comfort.

Let’s hope enough of those predators are exposed through the Jeffrey Epstein case. But, you know, listening to George Webb, you think of the oil sheikhs and the girls being trafficked by Epstein and others, from the Balkans and dirt poor African countries, and you ask yourself, what are the odds of full exposure?