Category Archives: news

The Deepening Deep State

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By James Howard Kunstler

Source: Clusterfuck Nation

One amusing angle on the news media broadside about Russia “hacking” the US election is the failure to mention — or even imagine! — that the US incessantly and continually runs propaganda psy-ops against every other country in the world. And I’m not even including the venerable, old, out-in-the-open propaganda organs like Voice of America and Radio Free Europe (reminder: the Iron Curtain came down a quarter century ago). Do you suppose that nobody at Langley, or the Pentagon, or the NSA’s sprawling 1.5 million square foot Utah Data Center is laboring night and day to sow confusion among other societies to push our various agendas?

The main offensive started with The Washington Post’s publication on Nov 26 of “The List,” a story calling out dozens of blogs and web news-sites as purveyors of “fake news” fronting for Russian disinformation forces. The list included Zero Hedge, Naked Capitalism, and David Stockman’s blog. There were several whack-job sites mixed in the list for seasoning — The Daily Stormer (Nazis), Endtime.com (Evangelical apocalyptic), GalacticConnection (UFO shit). The rest range between tabloid-silly and genuine, valuable news commentary. What else would you expect in a society with an Internet AND a completely incoherent consensus about reality?

Pretty obviously, the struggle between mainstream news and Web news climaxed over the election, with the mainstream overwhelmingly pimping for Hillary, and then having a nervous breakdown when she lost. Desperate to explain the loss, the two leading old-line newspapers, The New York Times and The Washington Post, ran with the Russia-Hacks-Election story — because only Satanic intervention could explain the fall of Ms. It’s-My-Turn / I’m-With-Her. Thus, the story went, Russia hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC), gave the hacked emails to Wikileaks, and sabotaged not only Hillary herself but the livelihoods of every myrmidon in the American Deep State termite mound, an unforgivable act.

Also interestingly, these newspapers and their handmaidens on TV, were far less concerned as to whether the leaked information was true or not — e.g. the Clinton Foundation donors’ influence-peddling around arms deals made in the State Department; the DNC’s campaign to undermine Bernie Sanders in the primaries; DNC temporary chair (and CNN employee) Donna Brazille conveying debate questions to HRC; the content of HRC’s quarter-million-dollar speeches to Wall Street banks. All of that turned out to be true, of course.

Then, a few weeks after the election, the US House of Representatives passed H.R. 6393, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017. Blogger Ronald Thomas West reports:

Section 501 calls for the government to “counter active measures by Russia to exert covert influence … carried out in coordination with, or at the behest of, political leaders or the security services of the Russian Federation and the role of the Russian Federation has been hidden or not acknowledged publicly.”

The measure has not been passed by the Senate or signed into law yet, and the holiday recess may prevent that. But it is easy to see how it would empower the Deep State to shut down whichever websites they happened to not like. My reference to the Deep State might even imply to some readers that I’m infected by the paranoia virus. But I’m simply talking about the massive “security” and surveillance matrix that has unquestionably expanded since the 9/11 airplane attacks, creating a gigantic NSA superstructure above and beyond the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of Defense’s DIA, and the hoary old FBI.

A little paranoia about the growing fascist behavior of the US government is a useful corrective to trends that citizens ought to be concerned about — for instance, the militarization of police; the outrageous “civil forfeiture” scam that allows police to steal citizens cash and property without any due process of law; the preferential application of law as seen in the handling of the Clinton Foundation activities and the misconduct of banking executives; the attempt to impose a “cashless society” that would herd all citizens into a financial surveillance hub and eliminate their economic liberty.

These matters are especially crucial as the nation stumbles into the next financial crisis and the Deep State becomes desperate to harvest every nickel it can to rescue itself plus the cast of “systemically important” (Too-Big-To-Fail) banks and related institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are about to once again be left holding colossal bags of worthless non-performing mortgages, not to mention the pension funds and insurance companies that will also founder in the Great Unwind that is likely to commence as Trump hangs his golden logo over the White House portico.

‘Fake news stories’ eclipse ‘conspiracy theories’ in globalist/Sorosite lexicon

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By Wayne Madsen

Source: Intrepid Report

The corporate news media, allied with “media watchdog” groups, many financed with global billionaire troublemaker George Soros, have trotted out a new dog whistle to attack their opponents: “fake news stories.” The issue of “fake news stories” was even raised by outgoing President Barack Obama in a news conference in Berlin with German chancellor Angela Merkel. Both leaders cited “fake news stories” as something that threatens international stability.

Of course, there are an ample number of fake news stories that emanate from disreputable and discredited websites, many of them vanity sites intending to serve as “click bait” for the unsuspecting web surfer and even a few professional journalists taken in by alarmist headlines. A number of individuals have been duped by totally fake stories written by “Sorcha Faal,” a pseudonym for David Booth, allegedly a U.S. computer programmer and which may also be a pseudonym for another individual or group of individuals. Faal, Booth, or whatever his name is acts as a cyber version of an arsonist who releases fake stories attributed to Russian intelligence sources and then sits back to assess the impact of his prankster works. The fact that a number of Russian news organizations have re-published Faal/Booth fake articles as actual news leads some to believe that U.S. intelligence plays a role in the obvious disinformation operation. Faal/Booth has a number of competitors in the field of cyber-pranksterism.

However, the most prominent purveyors of fake news stories are the very corporate media entities that decry “fake news.” There are a number of examples of corporate media trafficking in fake news. The following are a few stark examples:

  • In 1981, Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for a story about an 8-year old heroin addict named “Jimmy.” Washington, DC, Mayor Marion Barry was taken in by the story and launched a city-wide effort to search for “Jimmy” and provide him with treatment. Barry claimed “Jimmy” was real but, in fact, Cooke made up the entire story of “Jimmy’s World” and Barry lied about the supposed existence of the boy. Although Cooke’s story was totally fake, Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward submitted it to the Pulitzer committee for an award for best feature writing. Woodward, who concocted the fictional “Deep Throat” source in his Watergate reporting for the Post, was never sanctioned for advancing a fake story for a supposed serious professional journalism honor. The Post can be attributed to two major “fake news stories”—”Jimmy” the heroin addict and “Deep Throat” the high-level Nixon administration source who was not FBI deputy director Mark Felt.
  • New York Times reporter Jayson Blair wrote a series of fake news stories for the so-called “paper of record.” The following are a few of his fake news headlines that appeared in the Times:

 

October 30, 2002—”US Sniper Case Seen as a Barrier to a Confession.”
February 10, 2003—”Peace and Answers Eluding Victims of the Sniper Attacks.”
March 3, 2003—”Making Sniper Suspect Talk Puts Detective in Spotlight.”
March 27, 2003—”Relatives of Missing Soldiers Dread Hearing Worse News.”
April 3, 2003—”Rescue in Iraq and a ‘Big Stir’ in West Virginia.”
April 7, 2003—”For One Pastor, the War Hits Home.”
April 19, 2003—””In Military Wards, Questions and Fears from the Wounded.”

Blair made up from whole cloth stories about the DC sniper and Iraq war veterans. In all, 36 of the 73 national stories penned by Blair were fake. However, a number of media outlets, including the Times, reported as fact fake stories about Saddam Hussein’s “weapons of mass destruction,” all of which were false. New York Times reporter Judith Miller reported as fact information from Iraqi exiled leader Ahmed Chalabi alleging that Iraq possessed mobile weapons laboratories. The information was false, as was other U.S. “intelligence” on Iraq that was fed Miller and other reporters that was all bogus, including stories on Saddam Hussein allegedly trying to procure yellow cake uranium from Niger.

  • In May 1998, Stephen Glass of The New Republic wrote an article titled “Hack Heaven” about a 15-year old hacker and a non-existent software firm called “Jukt Micronics.” It was later determined that 27 articles Glass wrote for The New Republic were fabrications.
  • USA Today reporter and Pulitzer nominee Jack Kelly allegedly fabricated a number of stories for the newspaper, including a 1999 story alleging that the Yugoslavian armed forces was ordered to ethnically cleanse an Albanian village in Kosovo.
  • The Dateline NBC story of November 17, 1992, titled “Waiting to Explode” and alleging that poor fuel tank design caused General Motors’ pick-up trucks to explode on impact was based on rigged tests and staged explosions.
  • NBC anchor Brian Williams was suspended after making several false claims about his prior reporting. He claimed to have been riding on board an Army Chinook helicopter that was forced to land in an Iraqi desert after it was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. The story was false as was another in which Williams claimed to have flown into Baghdad with Navy SEAL Team 6. Williams also falsely claimed to have seen a man commit suicide in the New Orleans Superdome in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. Williams also claimed to have personally witnessed the Berlin Wall coming down. He was not in Berlin until a day after the wall fell.
  • In 2013, CBS “60 Minutes” interviewed a U.S. security contractor who claimed he witnessed the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012. The contractor was not in Benghazi during the attack and the account was bogus.
  • Rolling Stone published a falsified story in 2014 about a University of Virginia gang rape victim named “Jackie” and school administrator Nicole Eramo. The magazine falsely claimed that Eramo covered up rape incidents at the university. A federal jury later found that Rolling Stone libeled Eramo.
  • Several news organizations falsely claimed that security guard Richard Jewell was the chief suspect in the July 27, 1996, bombing of Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta. Jewell successfully sued CNN, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (“FBI suspects ‘hero’ guard may have planted bomb”), NBC, and The New York Post for libel.
  • Fox News often featured a commentator named Wayne Simmons, described by the network as a former CIA “operative.” In fact, Simmons never worked for the CIA and he was a fraud. He was later sentenced to 33 months in prison for his fraudulent activities.

The corporate media is legitimized by a very phony “arbiter” of what and what does not constitute accurate news: the very problematic Snopes.com. Snopes traffics in as much fakery in its “debunking” of alternative media articles as does the corporate media in its national and international reporting.

It is clear that Obama, Merkel, the Soros operation, and others are attacking “fake news stories” in order to hide the real target for their invective rhetoric: the alternative media, which does not kow-tow to corporate executives, advertisers, and special interests ranging from Big Pharma to the Israeli Lobby. The alternative media provides the lifeblood for the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of the press. The corporate media is a bloated and deceitful artifice whose time is coming to an end.

 

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The Top 10 Most Damaging WikiLeaks (so far)

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From MostDamagingWikileaks.com

1. Obama lied: he knew about Hillary’s secret server and wrote to her using a pseudonym, cover-up happened (intent to destroy evidence)

  • I cannot state how huge this is, it’s a cover-up involving the President of the United States. There are a lot of emails implying this, but this email states it very clearly so anyone can understand.  The email proves obstruction of justice and shows how they lied to the FBI, and likely perjury of Congress. This at the very least proves intent by her Chief of Staff.

  • Obama used executive privilege in their correspondence. Cheryl Mills (who was given immunity) states they need to “clean up” the Clinton/Obama e-mails because they lacked state.gov.

  • Additionally, Obama on video publicly denied knowing about the server. He also claimed on video that he learned about the secret server through the news like everyone else. The corruption goes all the way to the top! Obama is lying to the American public.

  • Hillary Clinton set up her private server to hide her pay to play deals discovered throughout these leaks, and to prevent FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests.

  • Paul Combetta was hired to modify the email headers that referred to a VERY VERY VIP individual, i.e. change the name of who it was from. If you read Stonetear/Combetta story, it’s easy to see this is exactly what he was attempting. He wanted to change header information on already sent mail to show “state.gov” instead of Hillary’s private email address. Multiple people informed him of the infeasibility (and illegality) of it, so somewhere in the next 6 days, it was decided that simply eradicating them was the only option left.

  • The FBI said they could find no intent to break the law, therefore no recommendation of prosecution.  This email proves, in plain language, that there was intention, and knowingly broke the law.

  • Ask yourselves: Why would they both be communicating on a secret server to each other? Why not through normal proper channels? What were they hiding? We may soon find out.

 

2. Hillary Clinton dreams of completely “open borders”

  • This was stated at one of her $225,000 paid secret speeches to Wall Street that she has tried desperately to hide. This email contains those speeches in those attachments.

  • Border protection is important. Borders add safety and sovereignty to a country. Borders help prevent illegal immigration, which limits crime, drugs, human/sex trafficking across the border and allows more Americans (including African Americans and Latinos) to get jobs. It also costs the working class an exorbitant amount of money in higher taxes and leads to higher national debt. Mexico protects their southern border (with the help of $75 million from Obama).

  • During the 3rd debate, Hillary tried to pivot away from this damning topic by stating she only meant energy. Read the quote for yourself, energy is just one aspect of her open borders policy.

 

3. Hillary Clinton received money from and supported nations that she KNEW funded ISIS and terrorists

  • Hillary’s Chief of Staff admits in the 2nd link that foreign interests sway Hillary to do what they want her to do (money for mandatory appearances).  She also admits that the “Friend of Hillary” list is available and rentable to people who want to influence, but that it’s too sensitive to talk in email.

  • This leak shows Hillary knows Saudis and Qatar are funding ISIS, which is an enemy of the state.  After knowing this, Hillary accepted tens of millions in donations from these terrorist-funding governments (of course they are getting something back in return). She also supported arms deals to them.

  • Saudi Arabia and Qatar commit horrible acts under Sharia law, including throwing gay people off of buildings, persecuting Christians, Jews, and atheists, and making it legal to rape and beat women. They are the leading funders of Hillary and her campaign through the Clinton Foundation.

 

4. Hillary has public positions on policy and her private ones

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/927

  • “But If Everybody’s Watching, You Know, All Of The Back Room Discussions And The Deals, You Know, Then People Get A Little Nervous, To Say The Least. So, You Need Both A Public And A Private Position.”

  • This leak is a big one because anything she tells us that she will do can and should be considered questionable. Whenever Hillary tells the public a position, a goal, or what she will do for America, there is no way we can be sure if she has an opposite, private position.

  • This was one of her private paid $225,000 speeches to Wall Street. Behind closed doors she is telling her Wall Street donors one thing, and the American people another thing.  Think about that for a moment…

 

5. Paying people to incite violence and unrest at Trump rallies

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/3833

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/31335

  • “Engage immigrant rights organizations. DREAMers have been bird dogging Republican presidential candidates on DACA/DAPA, but they’ve learned to respond. There’s an opportunity to bird dog and record questions about Trump’s comments and connect it to the policy.”

  • “It doesn’t matter what the friggin’ legal and ethics people say, we need to win this motherfucker” (from video below)

  • “I mean honestly, it is not hard to get some of these ass holes to pop off, it’s a matter of showing up, to want to get into the rally, in a Planned Parenthood t-shirt. Or, Trump is a Nazi, you know? You can message to draw them out, and draw them to punch you.”

  • This video is the proof, please watch it!

  • “Bird-dogging” is a term coined by high level Clinton staffers who openly talk about it in the video.  They boast about inciting violence at Trump rallies, paying for every “protest”, manipulating Americans through the media to think that Trump is dangerous, and tricking people into thinking Trump supporters are violent and bad.

  • They laugh about paying off mentally ill and homeless people for years to incite violence against conservatives.  Truly despicable.  And they pretended to be Bernie supporters while they were “protesting”.

  • They admit to starting the Chicago riot where police were seriously hurt, and admit to shutting down the freeway in Arizona, partnering with Black Lives Matter. We even have proof that Hillary paid people to shut down the Chicago rally.

  • Inciting a riot is illegal under 18 US Code § 2102.

  • They also think 50% of people in Iowa and Wisconsin are racists, as they state in the video.

  • Robby Mook, Clinton Campaign Manager, mentions the Priorities SuperPAC in a leak, which is implicated in the video.

  • Bob Creamer (who was fired) claims in the video that the campaign knew about everything.  Bob Creamer visited the White House 340 times and personally met with Obama 45 times.

 

6. Hillary’s campaign wants “unaware” and “compliant” citizens

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/3599

  • “And as I’ve mentioned, we’ve all been quite content to demean government, drop civics and in general conspire to produce an unaware and compliant citizenry. The unawareness remains strong but compliance is obviously fading rapidly. This problem demands some serious, serious thinking – and not just poll driven, demographically-inspired messaging.”

  • The Clinton campaign is literally conspiring to keep the population unaware of what is going on, and they admitted it in this email. Very scary ‘1984’ level thinking (group-think). If Hillary is the right choice for president and the truth is on her side, they should encourage their supporters to be aware and do research on both candidates.

  • Watch this video about it.

 

7. Top Hillary aides mock Catholics for their faith

  • Top Clinton aides, John Halpin and Jennifer Palmieri mock Catholics for their faith. They complain about the large number of Catholics in prominent positions.

  • This was one of the few emails to actually make it to the mainstream media (FOX) and Palmieri when confronted about this revelation didn’t apologize.

  • Brian Burch, CatholicVote.org president released a statement proclaiming, “Hillary Clinton has already called half of her opponents’ supporters ‘a basket of deplorables’ and ‘irredeemable,’ and now it comes out that her campaign spokeswoman dismissively question[ed] the sincerity of Catholic Americans’ faith. Had Palmieri spoken this way about other groups, she [would be] dismissed. Palmieri must resign immediately or be fired.”

  • This revelation was brought up at the Al Smith dinner for Catholics.

 

8. Hillary deleted her incriminating emails. State covered it up. Asked about using White House executive privilege to hide from Congress.

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/9272#efmBI2BOJ

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/9545

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/34370

  • https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/32007

  • “They do not plan to release anything publicly, so no posting online or anything public-facing, just to the committee.”

  • “That of course includes the emails Sid turned over that HRC didn’t, which will make clear to them that she didn’t have them in the first place, deleted them, or didn’t turn them over. It also includes emails that HRC had that Sid didn’t.”

  • “Think we should hold emails to and from potus? That’s the heart of his exec privilege. We could get them to ask for that. They may not care, but I seems like they will.”

  • “We brought up the existence of emails in reserach this summer but were told that everything was taken care of.”

  • “That of course includes the emails Sid turned over that HRC didn’t, which will make clear to them that she didn’t have them in the first place, deleted them, or didn’t turn them over.”

  • The State Department was:

    • (1) Coordinating with the Clinton political campaign.

    • (2) Colluding with the press to spin it positively.

    • (3) Doing so BEFORE they released it to AN EQUAL BRANCH OF GOVERNMENT. The Clinton campaign was always a step ahead of the committee investigating them. Shameful.

  • Nick states “Just spoke to State” He goes on to reveal that State colluded with him about which emails are being revealed to committee and that the State plans to plant a story with AP.

  • Shows intent to withhold emails from the subpoena.

 

9. Bribery: King of Morocco gave Clinton Foundation $12 million for a meeting with Hillary, 6 months later Morocco gets weapons

  • This is AFTER her candidacy announcement!

  • Very important e-mail in that it demonstrates Hillary’s poor judgement (her idea) in the face of influence money and foreshadows how a Clinton Administration would be indebted to bad actors and criminal regimes.

  • The “same issues we discussed” mentioned by Robbie Mook in this email is a veiled reference to Morocco’s many human rights abuses.

  • Her campaign staff is rightly concerned about the optics of the Clinton Foundation/Clinton Global Initiative accepting huge sums of money from a regime that so frequently violates international law and acts in a way that you’d expect the Clinton Foundation to publicly rebuke.

  • It seems $12 million is just too much money to allow morals, ethics, and the best interests and values of American citizens to intervene.

  • The Intercept explores how Morocco is exploiting Hillary’s weakness for huge donations, and her desire to be President, to support their own geopolitical interests.

 

10. “Spirit Cooking” (Warning: satanic/extremely graphic)

  • The email is from Marina Abramovic and John Podesta’s brother Tony, asking John to come “to the Spirit Cooking dinner”. It is safe to assume that John knows who Marina Abramovic is, as his brother refers to only her first name. John also invited Marina Abramovic to Hillary’s campaign launch.

  • Here’s where it gets graphic: Marina Abramovic has a webpage that shows the graphical book she created, which goes over what “Spirit Cooking” is.

  • And here is a video on what Spirit Cooking actually is.  Not for the faint of heart (satanic/occult).  Hillary’s team (potential future leaders of our country) are into some really messed up stuff.

  • Note: they will try to claim it is just “art” but than the invitation for “Spirit Cooking dinner” would seem out of place. Additionally, she also had a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) where she states, “If you are doing the occult magic in the context of art or in a gallery, then it is the art. If you are doing it in different context, in spiritual circles or private house or on TV shows, it is not art.”

  • Abramovic’s Twitter username is AbramovicM666 as well.

  • There are photos of her cradling a decapitated goat head, and that is on the tame side considering her other actions.

  • At a Hillary concert, Jay Z (a Hillary endorser) has been photographed with the Spirit Cooker herself, who appears to be motivating him before the concert.

  • Here is Lady Gaga (a Hillary endorser) in an EXTREMELY graphic photo with Abramovic participating in a Spirit Cooking dinner.

  • Is Hillary involved with these satanic rituals? All we know is that in recently released State Department emails, Hillary asks if Marina is coming to an event. The Clinton Foundation gave $10,000 (p. 66) to Marina Abramovic.  According to CNN, Hillary has been written about participating in rituals to contact dead people such as Eleanor Roosevelt and Mahatma Gandhi. Bill Clinton’s book describes how he and Hillary would partake in voodoo rituals in Haiti. Hillary’s mentor is Saul Alinski, who praises Lucifer in his book Rules for Radicals. No concrete evidence, just circumstantial.

  • John Podesta also has incredibly deranged artwork inside his house as documented by the Washington Post.  Once this Spirit Cooking story broke, it sppread like wildfire over social media, and the Washington Post (who has been proven in the leaks to be in Hillary’s pocket) deleted the art

  • This video sums up this incredibly bizarre and disturbing story.  This picture includes even more info.

Libeled by the Washington Post in a ‘False News’ McCarthyite Attack on Alternative Media

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By Dave Lindorff

Source: This Can’t Be Happening

Is the Pentagon behind this massive hit on independent journalism?

ThisCantBeHappening.net didn’t make the Washington Post’s list of 200 news sites that are “purveyors of Russian propaganda” designed to “undermine Americans’ faith in democracy,” but an article by yours truly published on our site on September 29 which was picked up by Counterpunch.org and run the following day was cited as “proof” that Counterpunch is just such a perfidious agent of Russian subversion of the US — which I guess supposedly “outs” me as one of those secret Russian agents in the US alternative media.

The article in question, headlined US Propaganda Campaign to Demonize Russia in Full Gear over One-Sided Dutch/Aussie Report on Flight 17 Downing, called out the Dutch “investigation” into that horrific shoot-down of a fully-loaded Malaysian jumbo jet over war-torn eastern Ukraine in 2013, pointing out that the prosecutors and investigators involved refused to accept any radar or transmission monitoring evidence offered by Russia or by separatist rebels in the region, using instead only evidence provided by the Ukrainian intelligence service and government — this despite the fact that both Ukraine and Russia possessed quantities of the BUK missile and mobile launchers that were known to have been involved in the downing of the plane, and should thus both be potential suspects in the case. I also noted that as reported by noted former AP investigative reporter Robert Parry on his own Consortium News site (also on the Washington Post’s hit list of Russian propaganda sites), and by retired CIA Senior Analyst Ray McGovern, the Dutch investigators never asked for nor received any satellite surveillance photos or NSA transcripts of relevant telecommunications concerning the shoot-down from the US, though such evidence certainly exists.

The Washington Post article in question, written by Craig Timberg — surely either one of the most credulous and lazy journalists working in a major US news organization (and that’s really an accomplishment!), or a rank propagandist for the US government posing as a journalist at the Post — relied upon only two sources for his dramatic “exposé” purporting to prove that a massive Russian propaganda campaign had surreptitiously attempted to undermine (perhaps successfully!) the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign and to throw the race to Donald Trump, at the same time undermining US foreign policy and faith in the US government while elevating the reputation of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Both sources are falsely described by Timberg as being “two teams of independent researchers.” The assumption we clearly are meant to have is that these organizations have no institutional bias.

In fact, the first of these sources, the Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI), turns out to be a hoary relic of the Cold War founded in 1955 by Robert Strausz-Hupé, an Austrian emigré and passionate anti-Communist. It has continued its anti-Russian propaganda stance since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the 2002 death of its founder and now boasts on its board of trustees jailbait like former Reagan National Security Advisor Robert McFarlane, a key player in the Reagan-era Iran Contra scandal who pleaded guilty to four counts of lying to Congress but was pardoned by President Reagan, arch-neocon and Russia-phobe Robert Kagan, a key promoter of the the US invasion or Iraq in 2003, and a whole host of other right-wing anti-Russian fanatics.

At least FRPI is willing to let people know who it is and who is running the joint. In contrast, the other of Timberg’s sources, PropOrNot, an organization with a website, PropOrNot.com, founded only several months ago, remains totally secret, providing no information on its site about its origins, its funding, its leadership or its staff. And yet Timberg confidently claims its information about Russia’s alleged epic propaganda effort was the result of the painstaking analytical work of these “experts.” In fact Timberg says the organization’s executive director, whom he quotes, asked for and received anonymity along with all his staff because they wanted to “avoid being targeted by Russia’s legions of skilled hackers.”

And the Post’s editors allow him to get away with this gutlessness and lack of transparency.

To get the full picture of how credulous and unprofessional — or willfully biased — Timberg’s editors at the Washington Post (often still considered one of the nation’s top “newspapers of record”), were in not vetting his article, read the Intercept’s article Washington Post Disgracefully Promotes a McCarthyite Blacklist from a New, Hidden and Very Shady Group, which devastatingly eviscerates both PropOrNot and the Post.

Suffice to say that besides allowing Timberg to use as the key source of his article and dramatic media blacklist an anonymous and clearly partisan group, PropOrNot, the Post’s editors also never required their supposedly crack “technology reporter” to even attempt to contact a single editor or journalist at any of the named alleged purveyors or “useful idiots” he was accusing of secretly spreading Russian-sourced “false news.” There’s not even a perfunctory: “Efforts to contact the editors at Counterpunch were unsuccessful” in the entire piece. Timberg and the editors of a paper that once gave us the Watergate story that brought down President Richard Nixon clearly didn’t even consider such basics of journalism important!

As we will see, there may be more than meets the eye to the hiding of PropOrNot’s secret personnel list, though. Bear with me.

I can vouchpersonally for Timberg’s lack of journalistic principle and reportorial effort.Counterpunch is listed on PropOrNot’s home page as number nine on the PropOrNot.org blacklist, under the headline: “Russian Propaganda Targets All Americans.” PropOrNot conveniently included two links to Counterpunch articles which it indicates make its case for including the site on their list. The first, under the heading “Review Article,” takes the reader to a page of Propornot.com and an article headlined: “Russia Useful Idiots Proliferate Russian Propaganda.” Below that snarky headline, the PropOrNet analyst Joel Harding gives an analysis of the article, in which he questions the author’s qualifications to be a self-described part of the American left, since he identifies himself as a socialist, which Harding then tells the reader “isn’t exactly the normal American ‘left’, but the ‘remnants of the Soviet’ left.” Comically, Harding fails to notice that actually the Counterpunch author in this case isn’t even a US resident, but describes himself as a “retired aerospace worker living in British Columbia.”

Clearly this is not a website given to sober expert analysis as characterized by the Post’s Timberg.

In any event, the reprint that follows Harding’s introduction, written by the Canadian Counterpunch contributor Robert Annis, and headlined “Western Media Propaganda Threatens Peace and Prolongs the Deadly Conflict in Eastern Ukraine,” which ran Sept. 2, reports quite factually, quoting such Western sources as Reuters and the New York Times, that a plurality of Swedes and Finns oppose their respective conservative governments’ efforts to join NATO. Annis then goes on to quite accurately write that US reporting on the civil war in eastern Ukraine fails to note that it is Ukrainian forces that are taking aggressive actions towards the separatist regions of Lugansk and Donetsk, not separatists (or Russians) invading the or threatening regions of Ukraine to the east of those two breakaway ethnic-Russian majority provinces.

Nothing in Annis’s article sources Russian information, and there is no evidence that Annis, who clearly identifies himself in his accompanying Counterpunch bio, as a Canadian socialist and as editor of the website The New Cold War: Ukraine and Beyond.

Think about it a moment. If that kind of open identification of the politics of its authors is how Counterpunch operates (and it is), it’s pretty hard to see how anyone, except for the incredibly credulous or disingenuous Timberg and his pathetic sources for his scare story could perceive the magazine as being a secret vehicle for promoting subversive Russian propaganda!

The second link in PropOrNot’s Counterpunch listing is under the heading “Absurd Pro-Russia Content.” This link leads directly to my article! Apparently in the view of the “experts” at PropOrNot, my piece is such blatant propaganda that no introduction and analysis by someone as skilled at detecting hidden bias and Russian perfidy as Harding is even required. I’m guessing it’s my lead, which refers ironically enough to the Pentagon’s own all-too real propaganda campaign aimed at Americans designed to convince them that Russia is an aggressive and existential threat to the United States.

And in fact, while our corporate media don’t talk about it, the US does run a vast propaganda operation, which includes the spawning and spreading of, guess what?, fake news stories! This kind of thing has gone on for years abroad, but since 2001, under both the Bush and Obama administrations, both the Pentagon and the US Information Agency have done away with an earlier ban on spreading such lies posing as news inside the US. Now we’re all fair game for US propaganda, which by the way the mainstream media routinely parrot. (Of course, we were already massively fed false stories by our mainstream media, from WMDs in Hussein’s Iraq to Assad’s chlorine gas attacks in Damascus, from only “moderate” Jihadi rebels being armed and trained in Syria to US hospital bombings like the one in Kunduz, Afghanistan being “accidents,” not deliberate targeting.)

In any event, no effort is made by either PropOrNot or Timberg to show how my article, which is based upon my own opinions and analysis, my own reporting, plus the excellent work of crack investigative journalists like Bob Parry, and experts like Ray McGovern, is either a piece of Russian propaganda, or a parroting of other articles that might be, in Timberg’s view, Russian propaganda.

I wrote an email to Timberg offering to explain to him how as a veteran, award-winning journalist and investigative reporter of 44 year’s experience with four critically reviewed books to my name and five years’ experience as a foreign correspondent for Business Week in Hong Kong and China, I select my stories to report on and to write, so that he might get the proverbial “other side” of his story out to readers. So far, Timberg hasn’t replied to that offer. I’m sure editors at some of the sites expressly named on Timberg’s PropOrNot list — none of whom he apparently bothered to try and contact while cobbling together his article — have done the same.

What it appears we really have here courtesy of Timberg and the Washington Post is a classic piece of McCarthyite red-baiting propaganda, complete with a call for the FBI and US Justice Department to investigate those on the list for possible violation of the US Espionage Act, the Foreign Agent Registration Act “and other related laws.” Any site that is critical of US foreign policy, who says anything favorable about Russia, or who was critical of Hillary Clinton, is suspected of being a Russian propagandist.

Where things get really serious is that if this Harding character — the guy whose byline appears in the introduction on PropOrNot’s first page of evidence against Counterpunch magazine — is what he appears to be, PropOrNot could actually be a Pentagon funded operation, which would make Timberg’s Washington Post hit piece on alternative news sites particularly outrageous, and his and the Post editors’ keeping of the site’s members and owners names secret a scandal of enormous proportions. Harding, I have discovered through some research on Google, while perhaps not a high-wattage secret propagandist spotter, does appear to be a major figure in PropOrNot — perhaps even its mysterious executive director? He describes himself on his own website as having this interesting background: 35 years “working national security issues,” including enlisted soldier in a Special Forces detachment, followed by a career as a military intel officer, at information operations at the Department of Defense, and organizer of InfowarCon, which hosts meetings on cyberwarfare.

And while some might take some pause at the source, Russia Insider, which describes itself as a media criticism site put out by a “group of expats living in Russia,” the site reports that Joel Harding, a current or retired brigadier general in the US Army and a self-described NATO advisor, heads a “team of dedicated internet trolls,” allegedly on the Pentagon payroll, who “openly libel and harass” journalists and authors whom the ever-vigilent Harding perceives to be Kremlin agents. No wonder PropOrNot wants its members’ identities kept secret!

If any of this stuff is correct, it means that this whole effort to tar the country’s leading alternative news sites and leading independent journalists on left and right as Russian agents workinF aspart of a propaganda conspiracy is really just a gigantic “fake news” story perpetrated by the government, and worse perhaps, the military — with the willing connivance of one of the country’s leading newspapers — an idea that should turn the stomach and infuriate any real American.

And remember, this is happening not because of the election of Donald Trump — the guy the Russians supposedly manipulated gullible American voters into putting into the White House. Rather, pretty evidently, it’s happening because some leading Democratic Party hacks, and the very clearly pro-Hillary Clinton Washington Post, are trying to divert the blame for Clinton’s stunning loss to Trump not on the Democratic Party’s and Clinton’s epic failure to connect with the working class voters they both long since abandoned, but on the alternative media that helped expose not just Clinton’s and the Democratic Establishment’s corruption, but the ugly reality of US militarism and foreign policy that both Clinton and the Democratic Party so enthusiastically back.

And while I’m certainly no purveyor of or “useful idiot” transmitter of “Russian propaganda,” I do plead guilty to being part of that alternative media, which is in the best traditions of American journalism going back to Tom Paine and John Peter Zenger.

 

Thanksgiving. A National Day Of Mourning.

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By Mr. Militant Negro

Source: The Militant Negro

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This Thanksgiving, join me in celebrating but not in the traditional way you’re used to celebrating. In the video below, I suggest 2 ways of celebrating with The Standing Rock Sioux Nation, The Water Protectors and The Oceti Sakowin to show unity and solidarity.

Thanksgiving: A National Day Of Mourning.

Published on Nov 20, 2016


Unarmed #NoDAPL water protectors are currently being attacked by militarized police in North Dakota. They’re being sprayed with water in sub-freezing temperatures, hit with rubber bullets, and maced.

You can express outrage and demand cessation by calling any and all of the numbers below:

  • White House Situation Room – 202-456-9431
    • I was told they’re “monitoring the situation.” I asked that the White House actually intervene on behalf of water protectors.
  • Morton County Sherriff Department – 701-328-8118
    • I left a voicemail saying I’d encourage no one to ever visit North Dakota ever again if they keep attacking unarmed citizens.
  • Governor Dalrymple – 701-328-8118
    • Voicemail full; I was unable to leave a message
  • North Dakota National Guard – 701-333-2000
    • No answer outside of business hours
  • Army Corps of Engineers – 202-761-8700
    • I left a voicemail asking that they please take any and every action to ensure (1) no further harm to water protectors and (2) DAPL stop efforts to drill, for benefit of this land and all its people.

Please call. Please protest the abuse of people and earth for profit.

Your voice can make a difference.

Follow #NoDAPL on Twitter for up-to-the-minute information

https://twitter.com/MrNegroMilitant/status/800608499231236096

Standing Rock 11/20 LIVE Bridge Protest by Kevin Gilbertt Part VI #NoDAPL

From The Raw Story:

Broken treaties, cultural genocide and murder: Here are 5 ways the US has ‘given thanks’ to Native Americans

By 

The urban legend about Thanksgiving is that the Native Americans helped save the Pilgrims who had a rough start to their settlements. Once they had a bountiful harvest they invited their Native neighbors over for a nice dinner party to give thanks to them and to God. That story has been soundly refuted by actual accounts of the day, but for reasons passing in understanding, we still celebrate the holiday as we perceive it went down.

After that, however, the friendly relationship between Natives and white settlers was over, and what followed was 300 years of some of the most heartbreaking and disgraceful actions the United States has ever committed.

While there are hundreds, here are 5 huge ones:

1. Stolen Land

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From the day we landed in 1492 until even today, Native Americans are still fighting over land rights.

A Proclamation was signed by King George III of England in 1763, prohibiting any English settlers from pushing further west than the Appalachian Mountains and anyone already there would be required to move back east. Even across the ocean the King knew there were tensions between Natives and settlers. Unfortunately, the King had no real way of enforcing it and 13 years later the Colonies filed the Declaration of Independence and the war with England was on.

One of the worst and most disgusting things happened in the 1829 decision by the Supreme Court in Johnson v. M’Intosh. The court ruled that the U.S. Government could sell Native American land to non-Native people out from under the tribes. Believe it or not, they were actually trying to.

The decision began a set of rulings under the Marshall Court that outlined what is now referred to as the “Doctrine of Discovery.” It’s basically a set of western laws that “allowed” the legal framework to take land from aboriginals living on it because it was “discovered” by a European Christian monarchs. The logical conclusion that you can’t discover something if someone already lives there was basically thrown out thanks to the Marshall Court.

Who knows why they even bothered with the paperwork, it isn’t like they were going to be stopped anyway.

2. Andrew Jackson

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“This emigration should be voluntary, for it would be as cruel as unjust to compel the aborigines to abandon the graves of their fathers and seek a home in a distant land. But they should be distinctly informed that if they remain within the limits of the States they must be subject to their laws…” – President Andrew Jackson, State of the Union 1829

There were plenty of presidents that did horrific things to Native Americans, but for the most part Washington and Jefferson honored the idea of Native sovereignty. President Andrew Jackson did not.

On May 26, 1830 Congress passed the Indian Removal Act which gave the power to the President to “negotiate” the removal of all Native Americans and force them West of the Mississippi River. Jackson signed it into law and the farce of “negotiations” began.

In 1831, Georgia tried to pass a law that prevented Native Americans from being within the borders of their state. In 1833, Florida actually passed the same law. The Cherokees took Georgia to court and demanded an injunction to prevent the forced removal of the tribe from the state. In Cherokee v. Georgia The Supreme Court ruled that the tribal lands were not sovereign and were essentially a ward of the federal government.

But one year later in Worcester v. Georgia, a missionary working on Cherokee lands was arrested. He sued the State of Georgia claiming that the state had no legal authority on Native soil, that they were sovereign lands. The Supreme Court ruled that the tribes were sovereign and that Georgia had no legal authority.

You would have thought that the 1832 legal battle would have been the major way that the tribes were saved from governments violating laws and treaties left and right, but no. Jackson proposed to the Cherokees Tribe that they move to Oklahoma (then called Indian Territory). The Cherokee said no.

Jackson didn’t care. Between 1830 and 1850 he ordered the forced removal of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muskogee, Creek and Seminole people. It was called the Trail of Tears because so many people suffered from death, disease, starvation, exposure and more than 10,000 died on the way.

3. Re-Education and Cultural Genocide

Natives were considered savages when they fought back against the government attempting to steal their land, kill their people and force them to move. Those that were marched to what is now Oklahoma were considered the “5 Civilized Tribes” because they didn’t fight back the way many others did. They agreed to assimilate into some white culture for fear of being killed by the government.

But the U.S. government took it a step further when they started opening up boarding schools where Native children were sent and taught how to be Christian, relinquish their heritage, forget their traditions and act more “white.”

Richard Pratt was an Army Officer when he began building the schools that would teach Native children. He said he developed the idea while in “an Indian prison.” His philosophy, he described, was simple “Kill the Indian … Save the Man.” By killing the Native American traditions and upbringing in children, they hoped to begin ridding the country of what they considered to be the “savage” behavior.

Many of these children encountered what can only be described as abuse. They were beaten and put in isolation until they’d submit to the ways of white people.

4. Broken Treaties

Over 500 treaties were made with Native American tribes over the last several hundred years and over 370 of which had to do with land. All were broken or changed.

As CJ says in the video “How do you keep fighting these smaller injustices when they’re all from the mother of injustices?”

5. Murder

USA Committed Genocide Against Native Americans

Published on May 5, 2012

MICHAEL MOORE: It’s not envy, it’s war, and it is a class war, and it’s a war that has been perpetrated by the rich on to everybody else. I mean, the class war is one they started. The mistake they’ve made, just to deal with the racial part of this, is their boot has been on the necks of people of color since we began. This is a nation founded on genocide and built, built on the backs of slaves. Alright?
So, so we started with a racial problem. We went, we tried to actually eliminate one entire race, and then we used another race to build this country actually quite quickly as a new country into a world power. This country never would have had the wealth that it had had it not had slavery for a couple of hundred years. If it had had, if it had had to pay people, if it actually had to pay people to build America, you know, we might just be at that point in Utah where we’re joining the two rails together maybe at this point right now.

From the moment that Columbus “discovered” a place that already existed, Native Americans began to die. Whether from “Old World” diseases like small pox and measles, battles with government soldiers or outright murder, the population declined by 96 percent.

American historian David Stannard argued in his book American Holocaust that the annihilation of the Native Americans from 76 million on both American continents to just a quarter-million “in a string of genocide campaigns,” that killed “countless tens of millions” was by far the largest genocide in world history.

Sir Jeffrey Amherst, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, wrote to Colonel Henry Bouquet at Fort Pitt:

“You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians [with smallpox] by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method, that can serve to extirpate this execrable race.”

The intentional use of “germ warfare” to “extirpate this execrable race” is nothing more than brutal, hateful and horrific mass murder. Our country should be ashamed.

Even hundreds of years later, tribes are still fighting many of these same battles. Just last month, the federal government raided a Native American university that was growing a legal hemp crop as part of a pilot project under the Farm Bill.

The Lakota Tribe has been particularly hard hit. They have been fighting to preserve their land against the threat of the Keystone XL pipeline which the tribe argues would have caused an increase in the number of health and safety problems.

They’ve also had run-ins with local law enforcement and liquor stores that locate just outside dry tribal lands. At the same time their children have experienced appalling and cruel racism and outright assault from fellow South Dakota residents.

What we owe the Native Americans is a more complicated question, but for sure it begins with a greater respect and extends well beyond the limited reparations we’ve given them over the years. Perhaps it begins with the reclaiming of holidays like Columbus Day and Thanksgiving which have done nothing but perpetuate stereotypes and gloss over the history of violence and broken promises.

Happy Native American Heritage Month!

Thank you  The Raw Story & 

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American Indian Activist Russell Means Powerful Speech, 1989

Published on Oct 22, 2013

Legendary Russell Means harshly criticizes the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Indian leadership of reservations. One of a kind, RIP November 10, 1939 — October 22, 2012

Russell was an Oglala Sioux activist for the rights of American Indian people. He became a prominent member of the American Indian Movement (AIM) after joining the organization in 1968, and helped organize notable events that attracted national and international media coverage.

Russell Means has lived a life like few others in this century — revered for his selfless accomplishments and remarkable bravery. He was born into a society and guided by a way of life that gently denies the self in order to promote the survival and betterment of family and community. His culture is driven by tradition, which at once links the past to the present.

Russell Means was once called the “biggest, baddest, meanest, angriest, most famous American Indian activist of the late 20th century.”

He led a 71-day armed standoff in 1973 against federal agents at Wounded Knee, a tiny hamlet in the heart of South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation.

It is considered to be one of his most famous act of defiance, however, occurred at Wounded Knee on February 27, 1973. Responding to the numerous murders perpetrated by puppet tribal governments and the extreme conditions of oppression, the takeover at Wounded Knee revisited the sight of the American Indian massacre at the hands of U.S. soldiers in 1890.

Ever vigilant for his cause, Russell has been lauded by the international community for his tireless efforts.

Later, he used film as a vehicle for his advocacy, thus enabling him to use different means to communicate his vital truths. Through the power of media, his vision was to create peaceful and positive images celebrating the magic and mystery of his American Indian heritage.

In contemplating the fundamental issues about the world in which we live, he was committed to educating all people about our most crucial battle-the preservation on the earth.

Means joined “The Longest Walk” in 1978 to protest a new tide of anti-Indian legislation including the forced sterilization of Indian women. Following the walk, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution saying that national policy was to protect the rights of Indians, “to believe, express and exercise their traditional religions, including but not limited to access to sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and the freedom to worship through ceremonials and traditional rites.”

Russell Means has been called the most famous American Indian since Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse by the Los Angeles Times and recognized as a natural leader with a fearless dedication and indestructible sense of pride.

He took pride in having instituted programs for the betterment of his people: notable, the Porcupine Health Clinic (the only non government funded clinic in Indian Country) and KILI radio, the first Indian owned radio station.

Today, one of his principle goals has been the establishment of a “Total Immersion School”, which is based on a concept created by the Maori people of New Zealand, where children are immersed in the language, culture, science, music and storytelling of their own people.

Russell wanted to adapt this total immersion concept to the Indian way of life and philosophy which is taught from a perspective that will nurture a new generation of proud children educated in the context of their own heritage.

Russell Means has devoted his life to eliminating racism of any kind, and in so doing he leaves a historical imprint as the most revolutionary Indian leader of the late twentieth century.

Russell’s commitment to uplift the plight of his people escalated when he served as director of Cleveland’s American Indian Center.

It was there he met Dennis Banks, co-founder of the American Indian Movement, and embarked upon a relationship that would rocket them both into national prominence.

“If I want my people to be free, Americans have to be free.” –Russell Means

‘America is a stolen country’

Published on Jan 2, 2015

Alcoholism, unemployment and suicide are problems associated with Native American reservations in the US. But a new generation of young activists are dedicating themselves to a brighter future. Benjamin Zand from the BBC’s Pop-Up team is on a reservation in South Dakota — in the heart of America’s midwest.

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Right now, here today, our Native American brothers & sisters are being persecuted for being who they are.

The Standing Rock Sioux And The Water Protectors

Published on Nov 20, 2016

The treatment of the Native American Tribes who are standing united to protect THEIR Tribal lands, THEIR drinking water supply AND THEIR sacred burial grounds, are unacceptable, disgusting, disappointing and inhumane.

For A History of Native Americans Protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline & A Timeline, visit….
http://www.motherjones.com/environmen…

It’s time we stand united with The Native American Tribal Nations. It’s time we stop celebrating Thanksgiving, a racists holiday that actually celebrates the massacre and genocide of 100 MILLION indigenous people.

https://twitter.com/MrNegroMilitant/status/799835277988610048

People Of Color all over The United States Of America should unite and stop celebrating a holiday that glorifies the massacre of human life.

Water Protectors. Black Friday. Charity. Kindness. Focus. Action.

Published on Nov 21, 2016

Welcome to My Monday morning rants, raves & concerns. This voice video contains My thoughts on a plethora of issues, all current events and subjects we SHOULD ALL be pondering.

This is a link to The Jedi Youtube Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBC3…

This is a link to the explanation where “Black Friday” comes from and what it means:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4O5_…

Stand In Solidarity With The Standing Rock Sioux, The Water Protectors and The Oceti Sakowin.

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Pizzagate Update 11/22: Does Norway Pedo Ring Bust Have Clinton Connections?

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Last Sunday, as reported by the Associated Press and a variety of both independent and corporate news sources, a large pedophile ring involving 51 people was busted in Norway, leading to the arrest of 20 people, three convictions and a search for the others in different parts of the country. One of the most detailed reports so far came from Turkey’s Daily Sabah, reposted below:

Norway launches probe on pedophile network involving 51 people, 20 arrested

By DAILY SABAH WITH ASSOCIATED PRESS

Norwegian police said on Sunday they are investigating a grotesque pedophilia ring suspected of involvement in the abuse of at least 51 people, which includes the abuse of infants and at least one case of a suspect acknowledging abusing his own children. The latest incident is considered one of the largest child sexual abuse cases in the country’s history.

Deputy Police Chief Gunnar Floystad said that in they have arrested 20 men so far, with three convictions, in western Norway. The 31 other suspects are from other regions in Norway. Those facing charges are to receive a maximum penalty of up to 15 years in prison.

Floystad told reporters Sunday that many of the suspects are highly educated, and include lawyers and politicians. Two current or former elected officials, one teacher and a lawyer are allegedly among the accused. He said he could not reveal more details pending the conclusion of the investigation, known as “Dark Room,” which began in 2015. Prosecutors said the perpetrators met in the dark web, using encryption and anonymity to hide their tracks.

“We have the clear perception that like-minded individuals met with each other in the so-called dark net, where they could talk with one another and cultivate their interest in children in peace,” Hilde Reikrås, the head of Operation Dark Room, said at a press conference on Sunday, the Local Norway reported.

“There are several highly educated [individuals] with high IT skills. They’ve used encryption and anonymity to hide their tracks,” head police prosecutor Janne Ringset Heltne said at the Sunday press conference, adding that all of the perpetrators involved are allegedly men.

“The material shows the abuse of children of all ages, including infants,” Reikrås said. She also gave examples of the scope of the horrific abuse.

Coincidentally (or perhaps not), on the same day this story broke, another story involving Norway was widely reported among mostly independent and alternative sites. The following example is from The Daily Caller:

Norway Donations To Clinton Foundation To Fall Nearly 90% Off Peak

By Chuck Ross                                                     9:39 AM 11/20/2016

The Norwegian government’s planned contribution to the Clinton Foundation next year will be nearly 90 percent off its peak, news outlets in Norway are reporting.

Norway will donate 35.9 million kroner this year — or around $5.1 million — to the Clinton Health Access Initiative, a subsidiary of the Clinton Foundation, according to the Norwegian news outlet, Hegnar.

The Scandinavian nation will slash its donations by 36 percent next year to 23 million kroner. That marks a 87 percent decline from the 2015 peak.

The drastic cut could be a signal that other longtime Clinton Foundation donors will reduce donations in the wake of Hillary Clinton’s presidential loss.

Hegnar reported that Norway gave an average of 40 million kroner each year between 2007 and 2013. That jumped to 129 million kroner in 2014 and 174 million kroner — or $25 million — last year.

Norway’s ministry of foreign affairs said that it has not renewed pledges it had with the Clinton Foundation which ended in 2015.

“Norway has signed several agreements which aimed to help reduce maternal and child mortality in countries with high mortality burden to ensure progress on the [Millennium Development Goals],” Guri Solberg, the communications adviser for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told Finansavisen.

“Most of the agreements expired in 2015, in parallel with completion of the [Millennium Development Goals]. This is why the payments were particularly high in 2014 and 2015.”

Of course the reasoning behind this decision could be based on Clinton’s defeat and fears that the Trump administration might possibly investigate the pay-to-play scandal, but the timing coinciding with the pedophile bust is suspicious. What if, rather than being an outcome of Clinton’s defeat, the recent news from Norway are late-breaking indicators of what may have caused her defeat?

It’s no longer a secret that the U.S. electoral system is highly corrupt and susceptible to tampering. Both major parties are reluctant to change the status quo because both take advantage of it in varying degrees to retain a duopoly and for greater control over primary, general and local elections. The Trump victory was an anomaly because he didn’t seem to have support from the Republican establishment while Clinton had the backing of the neocons and the majority of corporate interests. Clinton was primed to win, and the fact that she didn’t (and is not directly challenging the results) is reasonable cause to suspect she may have been forced to stand down. The fact that earlier today Trump announced he would not be investigating Clinton gives further credence to the notion she was offered a “deal” (or ultimatum) by higher-ups.

Given what we’ve learned already from the Podesta emails, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that powerful elites in the U.S. had strong motivation to prevent four years of Clinton and Podesta in the spotlight. Any political figure connected to pedophilia, human trafficking or a host of other crimes can be easily controlled and manipulated through blackmail, but once the secret gets out they’re no longer effective salespuppets. Meanwhile, elites in Norway could be attempting to distance themselves from the Clinton Foundation for the same reasons. More information is needed to solidify this possible connection which is why the ongoing open-source investigation by multiple internet communities is essential.

 

Updates from DC Pizzagate:

UPDATE 11/21 – SMOKING GUN FOUND. Anonymous member 0hour found multiple Twitter accounts with ACTUAL child porn posted. Please remember that Twitter has banned people like Milo for ‘saying mean things’, yet somehow these accounts remained. Before being banned, 0hour had linked to one username saying it was an FBI account. People in the comments confirmed there was a baby with an adult male penis being inserted into its mouth and other videos. The account was eventually suspended. People ended up finding 100’s of pedophile/child porn accounts by looking through the followers of the username 0hour posted. THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE 0HOUR!

I also read that 2GB of child porn was obtained by Anon from WeThePizza’s website. I have not seen confirmation of this yet, though. Quite frankly, I hope not to. This entire experience has shaken me to the core.

If you would like further information, please visit

 https://www.reddit.com/r/pizzagate/comments/5da0kp/comet_ping_pong_pizzagate_summary/

for a comprehensive review of connections and links by this amazing, now international crowd-sourced investigation.

20:46 Update 11/21 DON’T WORRY FOLKS, NYTIMES SAYS IT’S FAKE AND WE SHOULD FEEL BAD FOR THE PEDOS https://www.google.com/amp/mobile.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/technology/fact-check-this-pizzeria-is-not-a-child-trafficking-site.amp.html?client=safari

UPDATE 11/22 – The powers that be just shut down the sub Reddit r/pizzagate, but they let r/pedofriends exist. THINK ABOUT THAT FOR A MINUTE. 1984 is real, folks. Deleting subreddits and 4chan threads surely just SCREAMS innocent, right?? They claimed our crowd-sourced investigation is a “witch hunt”. LOL at admitting your Satanists. It’s not OUR fault Alefantis post incriminating photos sexualizing infants to the internet publicly. Too many mothers, fathers, and concerned citizens have seen the pictures to just let this all go as “fake news”.

UPDATE 11/23 – We are being bombarded by trolls continually gaslighting the accounts talking about PizzaGate online. Who pays these people? Only ad hominem attacks, nothing of real merit. Trust me, I do NOT want all this to be true, but until someone can explain the code talk, the Instagram pictures, the bands and businesses with all the pedophile symbols, I have to assume this is AT MINIMUM very important to look into. I keep reading the same robotic talking points, “This is a 4chan hoax!”. In response, I say Wikileaks emails are 100% accurate. The screenshots of James Alefantis’ Instagram are 100% genuine (I saw them personally before he went private). All other information is available online to confirm for yourself, please DO YOUR RESEARCH BEFORE SPREADING DISINFORMATION THAT THIS BLOG CONTAINS FAKE NEWS. The only thing I can not 100% verify the source from is the Obama picture. Some Anon posted it on 4chan and I haven’t seen any other sites reference it. Was it FBIAnon helping us out?

And if you still are not convinced, I challenge you to do your own fact checking and research. Basically the connections are so vast, there is no way to accurately summarize it in an essay meant to capture the immediate attention of the public. FBIAnon was right… It is like a spiderweb; it connects to powerful people not just around America but around the entire globe. Norway and Australia both recently exposed pedophile rings in high places. Soon it will be our turn to finally bring justice to some of the most heinous of crimes (and I use justice loosely, because there is NOTHING that will ever help these poor children to live a normal life after what they’ve been exposed to).

UPDATE 11/24 – Reddit CEO, username spez, admits to EDITING user comments without admin permission. Suspected Media Matters (connected to Alefantis’ ex-lover David Brock) disinformation talking points identified and seem to be taken straight from Saul Alinsky’s playbook which is dedicated to Lucifer:

  1. Accuse the accusers of what you are guilty of
  2. Gaslighting (making one question one’s sanity)
  3. Discredit source: 4chan hoax, autistic troll, obsessed with pedophiles, conspiracy theorist, alt-right, internet sleuths, psyop to false flag for fake news suppression etc.
  4. Do not acknowledge evidence, EVER
  5. THEY JUST LIKE PIZZA OKAY?

Please take this knowledge with you when on social media. Do not engage the trolls – just block them, otherwise they SUCCEED BY DISTRACTING YOU FROM INFORMING REAL PEOPLE. #PizzaGate #PedoFiles #Pedosta Highjack trending tags.

Go to your local independent media. Keep addressing the issue until they’re forced to acknowledge it. Go to the church. Angry Christians will unite to make their voices heard. If everybody tells only three people, we can multiply our forces exponentially. The more people that know, the more likely law enforcement will be forced into making arrests.

UPDATE 11/27 – Twitter has started locking my account for posting about #PizzaGate. I was forced to delete a jimmycomet’s Instagram pic due to “child sexual exploitation”. Does that count as solid evidence? Fox News and NPR join the list of pedophile protectors today. Below is a collective list of MSM which has completely distorted the facts of this investigation in attempt to slander us as tin-foil hat conspiracy theorists.

OFFICIAL THOUGHT POLICE:

  • New York Times
  • Washington Post
  • Bloomberg
  • Zero Hedge
  • Fox News
  • Veterans Today
  • NPR
  • Snopes
  • Yahoo
  • BBC
  • RT America
  • Independent
  • Guardian
  • Seattle Times
  • Globe and Mail
  • CNN
  • CBS
  • Sky News
  • Mashable
  • Daily Kos
  • TIME
  • Colbert Report
  • Business Insider
  • YouTube, Google, Twitter, FB, Reddit, 4chan in the form of censorship

We will not forget. We are the media now. Please comment other MSM sources I have missed attempting to silence us through the “fake news” narrative.

UPDATE 11/28 – New York Times CEO Mark Thompson accused of concealing evidence about notorious pedophile Jimmy Savile; now conceals evidence of #PizzaGate.

markthompsonNYT.PNG

UPDATE 11/29 – I was contacted by a producer at The Daily Show for interview. I responded with an email address which presents my real name, so if I stop updating soon then RIP me. Feel free to voice opinions on the matter in the comments. I honestly don’t know if I’m better off revealing myself (because the government already has my IP address, duh) and therefore it would look shady if I died suddenly… or I am better off as simply Anon.

UPDATE 12/01 – BBC joins pedo protectors and runs #PizzaGate hit-piece. It is worth mentioning James Alefantis has now professed on multiple platforms that Comet “doesn’t even have a basement”, yet just last year in an interview with Metro Weekly, he specifically said “Like our sauce — we harvest a whole crop of organic tomatoes — 10 tons of tomatoes every year. Can them all, store them in the basement…”. Ask a police officer whether lying is indication of guilt.😉

I also would like to mention I Google Maps searched Lovettsville in further investigation of the Tamera Luzzatto email to John Podesta which references a “farm in Lovettsville” and children for entertainment. It turns out only one Lovettsville exists and it is in Virginia – only one hour and five minutes away from D.C. in driving time. There are not many farms in this town. That’s why it stood out when Quarter Branch farm had something called the Fazenda Burity located on what looks to be pretty much the same property. The Google Maps description calls the Fazenda Burity a farm, but yet it has photos of a long building with many doors, people dining in an outside gathering area, a pool, and other photos which do not look anything like a farm. Even stranger still, the website listed on Google Maps for this location sends you to a site with a .br (Brazil) extension in Portuguese. Something does not seem right. Hai FBI, I know you’re probably reading this blog. PLEASE INVESTIGATE THIS SHIT.

12/03 – Strong evidence Facebook is censoring (or at least suppressing) #PizzaGate:

fbcensors(

All those tags just magically happen to be at 1k? Get real. And I know a lot of us are losing stamina… Feeling helpless because we all know arrests can’t happen now or Obama will just pardon them. I received this email two days ago; at first I didn’t think much of it but it is unlike any other email I’ve received thus far – it featured a lot of extra code, so it has piqued my curiosity. Here it is:

cryptic

It is cryptic. “You aren’t alone. Friends on the other side, will provide.” I hope it is true.

12/05 – FALSE FLAG ALERT! Many people suspect the supposed gunman yesterday was a false flag meant to be used to scrub PizzaGate from the internet in a way less obvious than the Orwellian route. Why do we think so? Number 1) They released his name as “Edgar Maddison Welch”. Edgar is a failed ACTOR; here’s his IMDB. Number 2) Just last month, the same Edgar Maddison Welch ran over a 13-year-old with his car. This leads to speculation the Comet “shooting” may have been part of a sweetheart deal. Number 3) Somebody moved the street camera which originally faced Comet Pizza so that it’s mostly blocked by a pole when viewed online through the city’s site. Check out this tweet from December 3rd, a day before the Comet incident: Thomas Bernpaine Sees the Future

Take all these odd circumstances into consideration, and you still may not be convinced. The biggest thing that sealed the deal in my mind is the reaction by the mainstream media. Instantly the biggest DNC shills, Jake Tapper etc. begin tweeting about the “dangerous consequences” of “fake news”. A verified account of some unknown-to-me Guardian/Huffington Post/Vice journalist by the name of @karengeier on Twitter begs WordPress to take down MY BLOG because “this is where a lot of them are getting information from” and “why have something even Reddit didn’t want”. CENSORSHIP ALERT, RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. Later at night, I began to see a call from journalists to SUE people like me. Folks, please ask yourselves this – if #PizzaGate were not real, would they have needed to delete 4chan threads and subreddits and now attempt to DELETE AND SUE A PERSONAL BLOG to hide something that is so obviously fake, in their opinion? I must ask why James Alefantis has not contacted me once either to A) clear his name and provide the rational explanation to all this or B) send a letter threatening defamation/libel if I do not take down this article. A friend who is a lawyer told me it is unlikely they would risk the investigation of a defamation suit due to things such as discovery depositions which they open themselves up to. I will provide update if any of the people in this blog contact me, which they can easily do through the contact link on this page… But alas, not a single communication has been made by the whole lot of them. What would be your first course of action if suddenly the internet [wrongly] thought you were a human trafficking pedophile?

12/08 – CENSORSHIP ALERT! Just as many had suspected, the powers that be have now begun the process of removing PizzaGate from the internet. As we speak, YouTube is deleting HUNDREDS of videos which display the evidence presented against those accused. I find this incredibly shocking and appalling because 99% of the information gathered in this investigation has been legally and publicly obtained through Wikileaks, search engine results and James Alefantis’ once PUBLIC Instagram (which has since been archived). I honestly feel I have awoke to find myself in a bad nightmare; I see the difference between North Korea and America is more arbitrary than previously conceived. During the first days of the investigation, this blog was on the first page of Google search results. Even just a week ago when I searched, dcpizzgate.wordpress.com was on the third page of search results. I searched last night and when simply typing in “pizzagate”, this blog no longer appears in any of the 20 pages of filtered results. That tells me this blog is effective in changing opinions, and it is therefore dangerous. Knowledge is power. Knowledge is a weapon. And that’s why they fear the spreading of this information. For weeks I have been looking at posts including my blog through Twitter search, but suddenly today the “all tweets” section yields “zero results”, even though the “top tweets” still displays results. Just yesterday, former State Dept. official Steve Pieczenik shared my blog on his Twitter. He has long spoken out about pedophilia within American government. Thank you for your dedication to exposing the truth – you’re a true hero.

Since the false flag event, I have been getting some threats… Calling me a sick fuck, saying I should give out my address so people kind find me, etc. Undoubtedly the majority of the emails I have received have been “thank you for exposing this” and people claiming to be somehow knowledgeable of the inside all saying that everything presented here is true and it goes even deeper. This blog is not meant to present all the evidence gathered; it is simply a red pill for normies.

12/09 – On December 1st, I updated about a farm in Lovettsville (a reference from the Tamera Luzzatto email to John Podesta about kids in the pool as entertainment) I found called Quarter Branch Farm. On December 7th, Quarter Branch posted on Facebook that they are closing permanently. Coincidence or guilty as sin? Thanks to the reader who sent me this tip.

Other points of interest:

For those who are unconvinced such powerful people could sexually abuse children and get away with it:

  1. Banned documentary Conspiracy of Silence CoS on YouTube
  2. The Franklin Cover-up FranklinScandal.com
  3. Boys for Sale BfS YouTube
  4. Johnny Gosch’s mother interview Noreen Gosch
  5. Hollywood’s Documented PizzaGate YouTube

If you would like to continue the research and help the global, crowd-sourced investigation to save the children from these horrific, unimaginably evil abuses, many say this is a good place: Voat Pizzagate Thread

Video Responses to PizzaGate:

Message from Anonymous

Titus Frost PizzaGate Intro

PressResetEarth Washington DC Elite Pedophile Ring FULLY EXPOSED

James Alefantis Answers to Angry Protestors

Activist Angel Promotes PizzaGate on Seattle TV Show

Response to ‘Fake News’ MSM Hit-piece

Besta Pizza Employee Admits their Logo was Pedophile Symbol

Payday Monsanto Calls the FBI to Report PizzaGate

Grown Man Teary-eyed Over PizzaGate

PizzaGate en Espanol

PizzaGate in Polish

PizzaGate in Finnish

PizzaGate in German

PizzaGate in Greek

Sign off note: Dear MSM, I voted for Bernie then third party. Stop smearing everyone investigating this as alt-right, Trump-supporting internet sleuths! This goes beyond politics; we are all merely concerned citizens and I believe rightfully so. If even 4chan is nauseated by this stuff, it must be pretty bad. Edit: In regards to criticism of the Satanic considerations – I don’t even believe in Jesus or Satan, but I’m calling it like I see it; these people think it’s fun to worship Satan, whatever that may be in reality. I simply think of it as evil and sociopathology.

Disclaimer: I do not condone or support the harassment or any sort of violence against the people listed or referenced in this blog. I do however condone peaceful protest and civil investigation, along with the death penalty for convicted pedophiles🙂 Maybe after some prolonged, otherwise unethical medical experimentation and living tissue brain research?

The Opperman Report 11.26.16

UnSpun 046 – “Pizzagate” 11.24.16

UnSpun 047 – “#Pizzagate Essential Update: NY Times, Podestas, Olson Twins, Miley Cyrus, Amanda Kleinman”11.30.16

UnSpun 049 “#PizzaGate to Date w/ Titus Frost” 11.15.16

Our Interesting Times – Joe Atwill on Pizzagate and the Secret Society 12.08.16

The Opperman Report 01.10.17

Facebook and Google Ready to Kill Alternative Media for the Government

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facebook-censorship

By Jake Anderson

Source: AntiMedia

This week three media goliaths — Facebook, Google, and Twitter, who collectively act as information gatekeepers for the Internet — announced they would begin implementing censorship practices against news sites they deem misleading.

Websites that publish “fake,” misleading, or even satirical news will now be subject to a sliding scale of infractions that will target ad revenue and social media algorithms. Without ad revenue from monetization platforms like Google Adsense, many of these sites would not be able to continue publishing, and without Facebook’s distribution platform, even sites with good organic reach could find their traffic severely crippled.

“Moving forward, we will restrict ad serving on pages that misrepresent, misstate, or conceal information about the publisher, the publisher’s content, or the primary purpose of the web property,” Google stated, following the lead of Mark Zuckerberg.

On a proprietary note, do these companies have the right to restrict users of their services who they deem to be in breach of contract? Yes. Is it understandable to want to exert some control over hacks who manipulate search engine and social media algorithms at the expense of a misinformed public? Yes. Does this exonerate the intellectual and cultural crime of using the specter of online ‘yellow journalism’ to deliver a crippling blow to the revenue streams of independent media…?

The move comes after Facebook and Google found themselves taking a lot of heat after the election. (Liberal) detractors went so far as to blame Facebook and Google for Trump’s win, claiming the constant online echo chamber of sensationalist news, unsubstantiated claims, and apocryphal headlines paved the way for Clinton’s electoral collapse.

The new restrictions will target a wide variety of websites: sites whose editorial content is deemed (by, Google, Facebook and Twitter’s board of directors, presumably?) false or misleading; sites that intend to invoke outrage with clickbait-y titles; and even sites that are purposely fake (such as the Onion’s sister site, Clickhole) for satirical purposes.

The websites on the new blacklist include Zero Hedge, The Free Thought Project, Collective Evolution, Disclose.TV, and dozens of others. The selections run the gamut from partisan propagandistic sites to alternative philosophy and healing resources. Unsurprisingly, alt-right darlings Infowars and Breitbart, both of which will soon wield vast power in the Trump administration, are targeted. In the case of Infowars, one might surmise the conservative Trumpland publication’s insistence that Hillary Clinton’s inner-circle practices satanic rituals had something to do with their inclusion on the list.

Some of the other sites on the list are surprising. Collective Evolution, as an example, may be considered by some to have New Age influences, but many of their articles practice sound journalistic ethics.

Why such a draconian response? Some analysts believe “fake news” had a role in flipping the results of the election away from what the mainstream media had predicted — away from their carefully groomed candidate. Their conscription of Google, Facebook, and Twitter (which may institute something called ‘mute’ filters) in order to exact revenge may cripple, if not destroy, an alternative media infrastructure that has grown into a formidable challenge to the traditional media establishment.

Because of how blatantly fascistic this move is, I struggle to respond to those who say, ‘Well, some of these sites are bad.’

Yes, some of them are, but that’s not the point. The point is that this is a Pandora’s Box scenario. Once we give the Corporate State the ability to curate online content via punitive measures, we’ve bestowed upon them the power to act as gatekeeper for a stunning amount of public knowledge. This is crony capitalism integrated into the very ethos of the fourth estate, using groupthink and the free market to drown out sites that don’t make the cut of acceptable. They will now be able to go through all news stories and delegate carte blanche which ones are “false” and must therefore be algorithmically and punitively castrated. They already used Russia as an excuse to not acknowledge Wikileaks impeccably researched leaks. What won’t they stoop to in order to conceal their future transgressions?

It will actually likely end up resembling aspects of the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership). In that (hopefully dead) trade agreement, corporate tribunals would have been given the power to overrule national laws that hurt their profits. Similarly, with the “fake news” control mechanism, the political-media-industrial complex will be able to determine which stories are damaging to their geopolitical and domestic narratives and then use Google, Facebook, and Twitter to suffocate any news articles that challenge these narratives. Half-truths and controversial op-eds will be cited as reasons for bans. Hacked information from Wikileaks cables could be cited as specious and without corroboration, or, more likely, Russian espionage (well, if Clinton were still around, at least).

There is another parallel, and it’s nothing less than 9/11 itself. After the terrorist attacks that tragically took the lives of over three thousand Americans, the government used the nation’s fear and collective trauma to ram through the Patriot Act, which created a matrix of laws that has been stripping us of our civil liberties for over 15 years. It appears the political establishment wants to use Clinton’s loss in a similar way: to bottle public anger over the election into the deliverable censorship of grassroots media. I’ve been claiming for months that the government’s next war would be on hackers and publishers of hacked material. It appears I may have been wrong (oops, I guess Google and Facebook ought to break our site over their knee). The next war could be on independent media, who the establishment rightfully believes is one of their biggest enemies at the moment. Who else can expose to everyday Americans that the government and their corporate goon-slaves are full of the worst kind of shit?

Let’s be clear: there are certainly sites on the list that publish bad journalism, sloppy journalism, or straight up lies. And sometimes it’s easy to find them. After all, Professor Melissa Zimdars (who contributed to the list) made the following astute point:

“Odd domain names generally equal odd and rarely truthful news.”

But whether or not some sites practice questionable editorial standards is completely beside the point. By attacking the finances of alternative media sites who publish controversial but well-researched journalism, the government is blacklisting an entire movement. The precedent Google and Facebook will establish with this move will have incalculable ramifications on the future of alternative media and the Corporate State’s ability to censor any story they deem dangerous. This is nothing short of a two-step with fascism.

If they don’t want “misleading” news, they better kill the networks.

Let’s unpack this for a moment and pretend that truthful journalism is really what Google and Facebook are after. If that were the case, they would need to cut off the revenue streams of CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, Fox, CBS, and all of the other mainstream news channels — you know, the same ones that collectively manipulated us into accepting the Iraq War and the subsequent regime change policies that have killed millions in the Middle East. And, see, that’s precisely the reason the mainstream media would never be held to these kinds of standards: they are a division of the State Department; they help manufacture consensus. You see, their “fake” news is important; the government’s fake news is real news.

Beyond just propagating blatantly misleading and fraudulent news (I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that the link I just used, which catalogs instances of mainstream media perpetuating false news, is on the new official list of “fake” news), the networks have long been guilty of commission by omission — curating the news cycles so that stories on critical issues like Standing Rock, TPP and others get a fraction of the air time of, say, an airplane crash or Trump’s latest gaffe.

This is Trojan horse for the government

In the Deep State (which you won’t hear even a mention of on network news), the government operates as a series of revolving doors between private defense contractors, media conglomerates, the surveillance apparatus, and giant financial institutions. After the revelations of Snowden (source is another from the list of fake news – be wary!), it became clear that the government was spying on and data mining American citizens with impunity in ways far worse than even 1984 had imagined.

Caught with their pants down, the government stopped, right? No. In fact, they doubled down, except they did something smart: they farmed it out to corporations and created a new synergistic surveillance state. Without Silicon Valley, many of the NSA’s transgressions could have never come to pass. Similarly, the government will now outsource its censorship game to corporations. Ironically, it will be Google and Facebook, two companies that represent the 21st century Information Age, who will be holding the cuffs.

This is another example corporations pitch hitting for the government, and it sets a horrifying precedent.

What can you do?

1. Don’t listen to them. Trust independent media (while being extremely discerning) over corporate media.

2. Help in the effort to create alternative and underground internet and social media infrastructure. A huge part of this is holding independent media accountable to accurate reporting, confirming sources, and obtaining original documents. Alt. media doesn’t have the same financial resources available to them, but with the ubiquity of the Internet, there’s no excuse for sloppy reporting.

3. Support alternative media with donations and content sharing.

4. Boycott mainstream media.

5. Tell Google and Facebook you disagree with censorship.

6. Encrypt (always encrypt). This isn’t necessary for some journalists — but if you are breaking a big story you should be using anonymous web tools like Tor, a VPN, as well as using encryption to transmit and unlock messages. Take a look at the Twitter account of information activist Cory Doctorow. He lists a long string of numbers and letters. That is his public key, otherwise known as asymmetric cryptography, which allows him to communicate information privately and anonymously. In the future, it will be unthinkable for journalists to not protect themselves, their data, and their sources in this way.

A Nonviolent Strategy to Liberate Syria

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Editor’s note: While we do not completely agree with the author’s analysis of factors leading to the strife in Syria, we share his desire for greater peace, freedom and stability in the region.

By Robert J. Burrowes

In early 2011, as the Arab Spring was moving across North Africa and the
Middle East, small groups of nonviolent activists in Syria, which has
been under martial law since 1963, started protesting against the brutal
dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad and demanding democratic reforms, the
release of political prisoners, an increase in freedoms, abolition of
the emergency law and an end to corruption.

By mid-March these protests, particularly in cities such as Damascus,
Aleppo and Daraa, had escalated and the ‘Day of Rage’ protest on 15
March 2011 is considered by many to mark the start of the nationwide
uprising against the Assad dictatorship. The dictatorship’s reaction to
the protests became violent on 16 March and on 18 March, after Friday
prayers, activists gathered at the al-Omari Mosque in Daraa were
attacked by security forces with water cannons and tear gas, followed by
live fire; four nonviolent activists were killed.

Within months, as the nonviolent protests expanded and spread, the
regime had killed hundreds of activists and arbitrarily arrested
thousands, subjecting many of them to brutal torture in detention. This
pattern has continued unchecked. For the earliest of a succession of
reports that document this regime violence against nonviolent activists,
see the Human Rights Watch report ‘”We’ve Never Seen Such Horror” Crimes
against Humanity by Syrian Security Forces‘.

For the most recent report, see the UN Human Rights Council report ‘Out
of Sight, Out of Mind: Deaths in Detention in the Syrian Arab Republic‘.

In recent commentaries on the war in Syria, both long-time solidarity
activist Terry Burke – see ‘U.S. Peace Activists Should Start Listening
to Progressive Syrian Voices‘
– and long-term Middle East scholar Professor Stephen Zunes have
encouraged the anti-war movement to listen to Syrian voices in framing
their response, particularly given the tendency within some sections of
it to support ‘the extraordinarily brutal Assad regime – a family
dictatorship rooted in the anti-leftist military wing of the Baath
Party’. See ‘Anti-war movement must listen to voices within Syria’s
civil war’.

One such Syrian voice is that of scholar and nonviolent activist
Professor Mohja Kahf. In her account of the Syrian uprising against the
Assad dictatorship – see ‘Then and Now: The Syrian Revolution to Date. A
young nonviolent resistance and the ensuing armed struggle‘
– Professor Kahf offers the following introductory paragraphs:

‘The Syrian uprising sprang from the country’s grassroots, especially
from youth in their teens, and adults in their twenties and thirties.
They, not seasoned oppositionists, began the uprising, and are its core
population. They share, rather than a particular ideology, a
generational experience of disenfranchisement and brutalization by a
corrupt, repressive, and massively armed ruling elite in Syria.

‘The uprising began nonviolently and the vast majority of its populace
maintained nonviolence as its path to pursue regime change and a
democratic Syria, until an armed flank emerged in August 2011.

‘The Syrian Revolution has morphed. From midsummer to autumn 2011, armed
resistance developed, political bodies formed to represent the
revolution outside Syria, and political Islamists of various sorts
entered the uprising scene. Since then, armed resistance has
overshadowed nonviolent resistance in Syria.

‘…political bodies and support groups for the revolution’s militarized
wing, have become venues for internal power struggles among opposition
factions and individuals, and entry-points for foreign powers attempting
to push their own agendas into a revolution sprung from Syrian
grievances, grown from the spilling of Syrian blood on Syrian soil.

‘Many in the global peace community can no longer discern the Syrian
uprising’s grassroots population through the smoke of armed conflict and
the troubling new actors on the scene. Further, some in the global left
or anti-imperialist camp understand the Syrian revolution only through
the endgame of geopolitics. In such a narrative, the uprising population
is nothing but the proxy of U.S. imperialism.

‘Such critics may acknowledge that the Assad regime is brutal, but
maintain from their armchairs that Syrians must bear this cost, because
this regime has its finger in the dike of U.S. imperialism, Zionism, and
Islamism. Or, perhaps they agree that a revolution against a brutal
dictator is not a bad idea, but wish for a nicer revolution, with better
players. Eyes riveted to their pencils and rulers and idées fixés, such
critics abandon a grassroots population of disenfranchised human beings
demanding basic human freedoms in Syria. This is a stunning and cruel
failure of vision.

‘The voices of the original grassroots revolution of Syria are
nonviolent, nonsectarian, noninterventionist, for the fall of the Assad
regime, and for the rise of a democratic, human rights upholding Syria
that is bound by the rule of law. They are still present in this
revolution. Who will hear them now, after so much dear blood has been
spilled, so much tender flesh crushed under blasted blocks of cement, so
much rightful anger unleashed?’

Other Syrian voices offer a similar account. See, for example, the
recent book by Robin Yassin-Kassab and Leila al-Shami titled ‘Burning
Country: Syrians in Revolution and War’
reviewed in ‘Book Review: Burning Country‘.

If Syrians and their solidarity allies are to develop and implement a
successful nonviolent grassroots strategy to end the war in/on Syria and
remove the Assad dictatorship, then we need a sound strategic framework
that guides the comprehensive planning of our strategy. Obviously, there
is no point designing a strategy that is incomplete or cannot be
successful.

A sound strategic framework simply enables us to think and plan
strategically so that once our strategy has been elaborated, it can be
widely shared and clearly understood by everyone involved. It also means
that nonviolent actions can then be implemented because they are known
to have strategic utility and that precise utility is understood in
advance. There is little point taking action at random, especially if
our opponent is powerful and committed (even if that ‘commitment’ is
insane, which is frequently the case).

There is a simple diagram presenting a 12-point strategic framework
illustrated here in the form of the ‘Nonviolent Strategy Wheel‘.

In order to think strategically about nonviolently resolving a violent
conflict, a clearly defined political purpose is needed; that is, a
simple summary statement of ‘what you want’. However, given the
complexity of the multifaceted conflict in the case of Syria, it is
strategically simpler to identify two political purposes. These might be
stated thus: 1. To end the war in/on Syria, and 2. To establish a
democratic form of government in Syria (which, obviously, requires
removal of the dictatorship).

Once the political purpose has been defined, the two strategic aims
(‘how you get what you want’) of the strategy acquire their meaning.
These two strategic aims (which are always the same whatever the
political purpose) are as follows: 1. To increase support for your
campaign by developing a network of groups who can assist you. 2. To
alter the will and undermine the power of those groups who support the
war/dictatorship.

While the two strategic aims are always the same, they are achieved via
a series of intermediate strategic goals which are always specific to
each struggle. To keep this article reasonably straightforward, I have
only identified a set of strategic goals that would be appropriate in
the context of ending the war in/on Syria below. For a basic set of
strategic goals appropriate for ending the dictatorship, see ‘Strategic
Aims‘.

Before listing the strategic goals for ending the war, I wish to
emphasize that I have only briefly discussed two aspects of a
comprehensive strategy to end the war in/on Syria: its political purpose
and its two strategic aims (with its many subsidiary strategic goals).
For the strategy to be effective, all twelve components of the strategic
framework should be planned (and then implemented). See Nonviolent
Defense/Liberation Strategy.
This will require, for example, that tactics that will achieve the
strategic goals must be carefully chosen and implemented bearing in mind
the vital distinction between the political objective and strategic goal
of any such tactic. See ‘The Political Objective and Strategic Goal of
Nonviolent Actions‘.

Strategic goals to end the war in/on Syria

I have outlined a basic list of strategic goals below although, it
should be noted, the list would be considerably longer as individual
organizations should be specified separately.

Many of these strategic goals would usually be tackled by action groups
working in solidarity with Syria campaigning within their own country.
Ideally they would be undertaken by activist groups with existing
expertise in the relevant area (for example, experience in campaigning
against a weapons corporation) but this is not essential.

Of course, individual activist groups would usually accept
responsibility for focusing their work on achieving just one or a few of
the strategic goals (which is why any single campaign within the overall
strategy is readily manageable).

It is the responsibility of the struggle’s strategic leadership to
ensure that each of the strategic goals, which should be identified and
prioritized according to their precise understanding of the
circumstances in Syria, (so, not necessarily precisely as identified
below) is being addressed (or to prioritize if resource limitations
require this).

So here is a set of strategic goals to end the war in/on Syria:

(1) To cause the women in [women’s organizations WO1, WO2, WO…] in Syria
to join the liberation strategy by participating in [your nominated
nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program
activities]. For example, simple nonviolent actions would be to wear a
national symbol (such as a badge of the Syrian revolutionary flag and/or
ribbons in the national colors) and/or to boycott all media outlets
supporting the war. For this item and many items hereafter, see the list
of possible actions that can be taken here: ‘198 Tactics of Nonviolent Action‘.

(2) To cause the workers in [trade unions T1, T2, T…] in Syria to join
the liberation strategy by participating in [your nominated nonviolent
action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities]. For
example, this might include withdrawing their labor from occupations
that support the Syrian military forces.

(3) To cause young people in Syria to resist conscription into the
Syrian military forces.

(4) To cause young people in Syria to refuse recruitment into the Free
Syrian Army, al-Qaeda and its affiliates/allies, the Islamic State
(Daesh) and its allies.

(5) To cause the members of [religious denominations R1, R2, R…] in
Syria to join the liberation strategy by participating in [your
nominated nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program
activities].

(6) To cause the members of [ethnic communities EC1, EC2, EC…] in Syria
to join the liberation strategy by participating in [your nominated
nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program
activities].

(7) To cause the activists, artists, musicians, intellectuals and other
key social groups in [organizations O1, O2, O…] in Syria to join the
liberation strategy by participating in [your nominated nonviolent
action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities].

(8) To cause the students in [student organizations S1, S2, S…] in Syria
to join the liberation strategy by participating in [your nominated
nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program
activities].

(9) To cause the soldiers in [military units M1, M2, M…] to refuse to
obey orders from the dictatorship to arrest, assault, torture and shoot
nonviolent activists and the other citizens of Syria.

(10) To cause the police in [police units P1, P2, P…] to refuse to obey
orders from the dictatorship to arrest, assault, torture and shoot
nonviolent activists and the other citizens of Syria.

(11) To cause young people in [the US, NATO countries, Russia and other
countries fighting in Syria] to refuse recruitment into their respective
military forces.

(12) To cause conscripts into the military forces of [NATO countries,
Russia and other countries fighting in Syria] that still use
conscription to conscientiously refuse to perform military duties.

(13) To cause military personnel in the military forces of [the US, NATO
countries, Russia and other countries fighting in Syria] to refuse
deployment to the war in/on Syria.

(14) To cause young people in [your country] to refuse recruitment into
the Free Syrian Army, al-Qaeda and its affiliates/allies, the Islamic
State (Daesh) and its allies.

(15) To cause former soldiers in [your country] to refuse recruitment as
mercenaries by corporations that supply ‘military contractors’ to fight
in Syria.

(16) To cause the activists in [peace groups P1, P2, P…] in [your
town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…]. For example, this might include boycotting all
commercial flights that use Boeing and Airbus passenger aircraft given
the heavy involvement of these corporations in the production of
military aircraft.

(17) To cause the activists in [environment groups E1, E2, E…] in [your
town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…]. For example, this might including boycotting
all commercial products of General Electric given the heavy involvement
of this corporation in the production of military engines, systems and
services.

(18) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T1,
T2, T….] in [your town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by
encouraging their members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary
products] of [weapons corporations W1, W2, W…].

(19) To cause the women in [women’s organizations WO1, WO2, WO…] in
[your town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…].

(20) To cause the members of [religious denominations R1, R2, R…] in
[your town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…].

(21) To cause the members of [ethnic communities EC4, EC5, EC…] in [your
town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…].

(22) To cause the artists, musicians, intellectuals and other key social
groups in [organizations O4, O5, O…] in [your town/city/country] to
resist the war on Syria by encouraging their members to boycott
[all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons corporations W1, W2,
W…].

(23) To cause the students in [student organizations S1, S2, S…] in
[your town/city/country] to resist the war on Syria by encouraging their
members to boycott [all/specified nonmilitary products] of [weapons
corporations W1, W2, W…].

(24) To cause the consumers in [your town/city/country] to resist the
war on Syria by boycotting [all/specified nonmilitary products] of
[weapons corporations W1, W2, W…].

(25) To cause more individuals in [your town/city/country] to resist the
war on Syria by conscientiously resisting paying [part/all] of their
taxes for war.

(26) To cause more organizations in [your town/city/country] to resist
the war on Syria by conscientiously resisting paying [part/all] of their
taxes for war.

(27) To cause [weapons corporations W4, W5, W…] to convert from the
manufacture of military weapons to [the specified/negotiated
socially/environmentally beneficial products].

(28) To cause [banks B1, B2, B…] to cease financing the weapons
industry.

(29) To cause bank customers to shift their deposits to ethical banks
and credit unions that do not finance (or are otherwise involved in) the
weapons industry.

(30) To cause [religious organizations R4, R5, R…] to divest from the
weapons industry.

(31) To cause [superannuation funds S1, S2, S…] to divest from the
weapons industry.

(32) To cause superannuation fund customers to shift their money to
ethical funds that do not finance (or are otherwise involved in) the
weapons industry.

(33) To cause [insurance companies I1, I2, I…] to divest from the
weapons industry.

(34) To cause insurance customers to shift their policies to ethical
insurance companies that do not finance (or are otherwise involved in)
the weapons industry.

(35) To cause [corporations C1, C2, C…] that provide
[services/components] for [weapons corporations W1, W2, W…] to cease
doing so.

(36) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T4,
T5, T…] to withdraw their labor from [weapons corporations W1, W2, W…]
[partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(37) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T7,
T8, T…] to withdraw their labor from [corporations C1, C2, C…]
[partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(38) To cause [corporations C4, C5, C…] that provides
[services/supplies] to [military bases MB1, MB2, MB…] to cease doing so.

(39) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T10,
T11, T…] who work in/supply [military bases MB1, MB2, MB…] to withdraw
their labor [partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(40) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T13,
T14, T…] to withdraw their labor from [corporations C4, C5, C…]
[partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(41) To cause [corporations C7, C8, C…] that manufacture and supply spy
satellites for military purposes to cease doing so.

(42) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T16,
T17, T…] to withdraw their labor from [corporations C7, C8, C…]
[partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(43) To cause [corporations C10, C11, C…] that provide
[services/components] for the militarization of space to cease doing so.

(44) To cause the workers in [trade unions or labor organizations T19,
T20, T…] to withdraw their labor from [corporations C10, C11, C…]
[partially/wholly], [temporarily/permanently].

(45) To cause [corporations C13, C14, C…] that provide private military
contractors (mercenaries) to fight in wars to cease doing so.

(46) To cause the private military contractors (mercenaries) who fight
in wars to withdraw their labor from [corporations C13, C14, C…].

(47) To cause the soldiers in [military units M1, M2, M…] in [your
town/city/country] to refuse to obey orders to [arrest, assault, torture
and shoot, depending on your local circumstances] nonviolent activists
campaigning against the war.

(48) To cause the police in [police units P1, P2, P…] in [your
town/city/country] to refuse to obey orders to [arrest, assault, torture
and shoot, depending on your local circumstances] nonviolent activists
campaigning against the war.

(49) To cause individual members of the military forces at [Military
Base MB1/Drone Base DB1/Navy Ship NS1/Air Force Base AFB1/Army unit
AU1/Marines unit MU1] in [your town/city/country] to resign.

(50) To cause individual members of those corporations that
employ/supply private military contractors (mercenaries) to resign.

As you can see, the two strategic aims are achieved via a series of
intermediate strategic goals.

Not all of the strategic goals will need to be achieved for the strategy
to be successful but each goal is focused in such a way that its
achievement functionally undermines the power of those conducting the
war.

The difference between success and failure in any struggle is the
soundness of the strategy.

 

Biodata: Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of ‘Why Violence?‘ His email address is flametree@riseup.netand his website is at http://robertjburrowes.wordpress.com

Robert J. Burrowes
P.O. Box 68
Daylesford
Victoria 3460
Australia
Email: flametree@riseup.net

Websites:
Nonviolence Charter
Flame Tree Project to Save Life on Earth
‘Why Violence?’
Nonviolent Campaign Strategy
Nonviolent Defense/Liberation Strategy
Anita: Songs of Nonviolence
Robert Burrowes
Global Nonviolence Network