Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Masters Of Chaos

Unsanctified Speakers,

Bernie Sanders has warned that the world is rapidly becoming an “international oligarchy” controlled by a tiny number of billionaires, highlighted by the revelations in the Paradise Papers. (Would President Sanders have been able to say this? No.)

Mike Kreiger on Donna Brazile's revelations about some particular elites, who are not remarkable, but typical in the world governance system which owns and rules us.
"The cat's out of the bag. In a world where we're talking to each other across the world and we've got billions of people that can communicate and say, 'what is wrong with these elitists? They're complete lunatics, and we don't need them.' They can't win… and so the only question for me is what comes next? I think the next five years will be the most chaotic five years that any of us alive will ever live."

The Nationless elites control the world. Money is power, and they have protected their power from nations, which they can manipulate and destroy as they see fit. If the nations cannot find common ground to stop this, the nations, and the peoples, and the environment, and the lovely elites will rapidly perish.
"Tax avoidance is now so systemic that the Queen’s own wealth managers apparently see nothing wrong with her receiving £82m a year from taxpayers while shunting £10m into the Caymans and elsewhere. Shuttling between tax havens is so commonplace that economist Gabriel Zucman describes it as an “elite sport”.

Jim Kunstler: "What Could Go Wrong?"
The economy isn’t growing and can’t grow. The economy is a remnant of something that used to exist, an industrial economy that has rolled over and died and come back as a moldy ghoul feeding on the ghostly memories of itself. Stocks go up because the unprecedented low interest rates established by the Fed allow company CEOs to “lever-up” issuing bonds (i.e. borrow “money” from, cough cough, “investors”) and then use the borrowed “money” to buy back their own stock to raise the share value, so they can justify their companies’ boards-of-directors jacking up their salaries and bonuses — based on the ghost of the idea that higher stock prices represent the creation of more actual things of value (front-end-loaders, pepperoni sticks, oil drilling rigs).

Stephen Hawking is worried about the intent of the people who control Artificial Intelligence, and the natural consequences of their success with it.
"Unless we learn how to prepare for, and avoid, the potential risks, AI could be the worst event in the history of our civilization. It brings dangers, like powerful autonomous weapons, or new ways for the few to oppress the many. It could bring great disruption to our economy."

Caitlin Johnstone on the church shooter in Sutherland Springs:
The mass media’s job is not to tell you what is happening in the world. The mass media’s job is to tell you that the country that is invading sovereign nations and dropping bombs on civilians are the good guys, while selling you Mountain Dew... There’s no way this doesn’t have an effect on the American psyche. Something so horrific, so abnormal, being normalized so aggressively day in and day out both overtly and subtly will necessarily warp people’s minds... The more time we spend bickering over how arbitrary words like “terrorism” should be used the less time we’re spending addressing this crucial component of the US war machine directly... America is in a state of endless war because the nationless plutocracy which has centralized itself there uses the US military as its personal mafia to bully potential rivals into compliance. This same plutocracy owns the mass media and uses it to manufacture public support for the behavior of its armed goon squad, because if Americans stop consenting to their money and resources being squandered on bombs, the civil unrest would cause major damage to their investments in the US... They need your consent. They wouldn’t work so hard to manufacture it if they didn’t.

Washington Stomps on Civil liberty, Paul Craig Roberts:  "Are you amazed that it is the executives of Facebook, Twitter, and Google, and not the members of Congress who have sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States, who point out to US Representatives and Senators that their demands for censorship and spying are unconstitutional?" (And these organizations are already deeply enmeshed with the CIA and NSA.)

According to a new report from The Hillearly drafts of former FBI Director James Comey's statement on Hillary Clinton's email case accused the former Secretary of State of "gross negligence" in her handling of classified information as opposed to the "extremely careless" phrase that made its way into the final statement. As The Hill further points out, the change in language is significant since federal law states that "gross negligence" in handling the nation’s intelligence can be punished criminally with prison time or fines whereas "extreme carelessness" has no such legal definition and/or ramifications.

Secretary of State Tillerson pushes hard to fulfill his commitment to finishing 10 year backlog of Freedom-of-Information requests by the end of the year. Supporters of former Secretary of State Clinton cry, "Politics!" (Tillerson needs to cut staff. Upper-echelon Clintonistas resigning when saddled with the distatesteful chores of their subordinates might be just right.)

Donna Brazile dedicates her book to Seth Rich:
TOUCHE'

"I've got economically zero unemployment in my city, and I've got thousands of homeless people that actually are working and just can't afford housing," said Seattle City Councilman Mike O'Brien. "There's nowhere for these folks to move to." (The new working-homelessness model of American democracy, where votes cost $1 billion each.)

The Public Bank Option: Safer, Local and Half the Cost:
Phil Murphy, a former banker with a double-digit lead in New Jersey’s race for governor, has made a state-owned bank a centerpiece of his platform. If he wins on November 7, the nation’s second state-owned bank in a century could follow.  (Bank of North Dakota model vs Federal Reserve model...)

Early this morning, Israeli Channel 10 news published a leaked diplomatic cable which had been sent to all Israeli ambassadors throughout the world concerning the chaotic events that unfolded over the weekend in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, which began with Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri's unexpected resignation after he was summoned to Riyadh by his Saudi-backers, and led to the Saudis announcing that Lebanon had "declared war" against the kingdom. The classified embassy cable, written in Hebrew, constitutes the first formal evidence proving that the Saudis and Israelis are deliberately coordinating to escalate the situation in the Middle East. 

Eleni sends this article examining the ongoing Israeli war against Lebanon, thwarted by Hezbollah, and currently being fought in Syria, as it goes into another phase.
The Israeli approach to a “good neighbor” policy, by providing aid and air support to Syrian armed groups in return for a security belt as the first line of defense, is neither effective nor sustainable. The Syrian regime shares control of the area surrounding the Golan Heights with armed opposition groups and extremist militants, which could lead to unintended escalation. As the Syrian war is winding down, a permanent agreement on who will ultimately control the Quneitra area will become necessary.

When Saudi Arabia says: "'Lebanon is hijacked by Hezbollah and Iran, Saudi will treat Lebanese gov as an enemy of its state" it means that KSA is at war.
But Saudi Arabia is presenting Hezbollah as a kind of" superpower" and/or a "state" to stand against, magnifying it.
The same style is usually used by Israel before taking action against #Hezbollah: Saudi Arabia is copying the rhetoric.

The new absolute monarch of Saudi Arabia is Crown Prince Mohamed Bin Salman (MBS acronym is weirdly recycled). He has purged rival factions of the royal family, with a couple of princely deaths and a whole lot of patronage payments now suddenly ended. This was an anti-corruption purge limited to his rivals. The young prince is brash, strong willed, appears devoutly religious, and is unhesitating to blitzkrieg. It says here that the is an asset of the UAE.

1200 Saudi bank accounts are frozen in that anti-corruption purge. (MBS seizes assets of rivals.)

Pepe Escobar casts more light:
The House of Saud’s King Salman devises an high-powered “anti-corruption” commission and appoints his son, Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman, a.k.a. MBS, as chairman.  Right on cue, the commission detains 11 House of Saud princes, four current ministers and dozens of former princes/cabinet secretaries – all charged with corruption. Hefty bank accounts are frozen, private jets are grounded. The high-profile accused lot is “jailed” at the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton.
War breaks out within the House of Saud, as Asia Times had anticipated back in July. Rumors have been swirling for months about a coup against MBS in the making. Instead, what just happened is yet another MBS pre-emptive coup.
A top Middle East business/investment source who has been doing deals for decades with the opaque House of Saud offers much-needed perspective: “This is more serious than it appears. The arrest of the two sons of previous King Abdullah, Princes Miteb and Turki, was a fatal mistake. This now endangers the King himself. It was only the regard for the King that protected MBS. There are many left in the army against MBS and they are enraged at the arrest of their commanders.”

Donald Trump, on his whirlwind tour of Asia, expresses hope that Vladimir Putin will help him with North Korea (China's Xi disappointed him.):

"I think we're making progress", Trump turns the volume down from 11 on North Korean standoff.

Lowering Expectations

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