Businesslike Wars

Misconceptualized Laborers,

Maybe a war for oil in Venezuela will be juuust-right. Let's stage the coup openly.

'US President Donald Trump's national security adviser Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster has met with Venezuela’s opposition leader and Parliament Speaker Julio Borges, who seek to oust the oil-rich country’s President Nicolas Maduro amid an economic crisis fueled by the 2014 crash of oil prices... Meanwhile, Maduro insists a new constitution is essential to fend off what he refers to as an attempted foreign-sponsored “coup” against his government."

http://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2017/05/07/520840/US-National-Security-Adviser-H-R-McMaster-Venezuela-opposition-leader-Julio-Borges-White-House

Right on cue, multinational military exercises, led by the US: "Given the U.S. fear of Venezuelan oil becoming the property of the Russian government, as well as the U.S.’ documented history of overthrowing and undermining leftist governments in Venezuela, “Operation: American United” may be less of a drill and more of what its name implies – a way to bring Venezuela, along with other South American nations, back into the fold of U.S. influence."

http://theantimedia.org/us-military-drills-embattled-venezuela/

Russia points out that a military blockade against ocean trade with North Korea is an act of war against the countries whose ships are stopped and boarded by the navy. (Just in case you forgot.)

https://www.rt.com/politics/387256-declaration-of-war-senator-blasts/

"A State Department official on Friday said that the Russian proposal calling to bar U.S. military aircraft from flying over designated safe zones cannot “limit” the U.S.’s mission against ISIS in the country in any way. “The coalition will continue to strike ISIS targets in Syria,” the official told The Wall Street Journal. “The campaign to defeat ISIS will continue at the same relentless pace as it is proceeding now.” A deal hammered out by Russia, Turkey and Iran to set up "de-escalation zones" in mostly opposition-held parts of Syria went into effect Saturday."

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/us-dismisses-russia%E2%80%99s-ban-on-military-aircraft-over-syria-safe-zones/ar-BBANG3d?OCID=ansmsnnews11

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov remarks that the members of the Trump administration "have not yet fully adjusted to each other". Thanks Eleni.

"There’s the traditional neo-con/deep state friendly galaxy where General McMaster and to a degree James ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis reside, there’s the Samantha Power 2.0 galaxy which is home of Nikki Haley, there’s the conservative, anti-Salifist/non-Russophobic galaxy of a seemingly isolated Steve Bannon and then there’s the Donald Trump galaxy where a long time ago and seemingly far away, Donald Trump actually knew what he stood for. Sean Spicer is meanwhile living in a strange galaxy where Hitler didn’t gas his people but Bashar al-Assad did. This place isn’t even worth exploring. One can only hope that Rex Tillerson, who for all his problems at least looks and acts in a professional manner, will be able to conduct relations with his counter-part Sergey Lavrov that by July, might be able to put an end to the confusion that seems to have paralysed the Trump administration."

http://theduran.com/russian-fm-lavrov-trump-admin-not-yet-fully-adjusting-to-each-other/

(Today, 5/10/17) Sergei Lavrov, Moscow’s top diplomat, will be in Washington for the first time since 2013. He is scheduled to meet Secretary of State Rex Tillerson at about 8:30 a.m. before huddling with Mr. Trump later in the morning. The Russian envoy’s visit reciprocates Mr. Tillerson’s trip to Moscow last month, when he met with President Vladimir Putin after meeting with other Russian officials. Russia has said it is working toward establishing a meeting between Messrs. Trump and Putin... Mr. Trump’s meeting with Mr. Lavrov comes as a plan by Russia, Iran and Turkey to set up “de-escalation zones” in Syria has been accompanied by Russian demands that U.S. planes stay away from the protected areas.

Update: Lavrov reacts to the Comey firing news... Shaking his head, he chirped sarcastically “Was he fired? Was he fired? You are kidding?!”

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-10/president-trump-meet-russian-foreign-minister-lavrov-today

President Trump “clearly stated his desire for businesslike” relations with Russia, according to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who met with President Trump Wednesday. "Very, very good meeting", remarked Trump.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-10/trump-has-very-very-good-meeting-lavrov-live-feed

The Future of Islam in Western Europe is a careful analysis, Thanks Eleni:

The threat has never been Islam. The threat is Takfirism. Here is how Wikipedia defines the concept of “Takfir”: In Islamic law, takfir or takfeer (Arabic: تكفير‎‎ takfīr) refers to the practice of excommunication, one Muslim declaring another Muslim as kafir (non-believer)... “Takfirism” is first and foremost a mindset. Guns and bullets cannot defeat a mindset. In fact, only ideas can defeat other ideas. The Russians know that... Islam and the Muslims who practice it were never the enemy. That the enemy was a relatively small sect of para-Islamic crazies which originated in the 13th century and which remained largely in the fringes of the Islamic world until it was given an immense boost first by the House of Saud and, later, by the US CIA. Today, the Takfiris are still the instrument of the AngloZionist Empire, they are the infection which is unleashed against any country daring to reject the Empire’s dominion. Furthermore, the Takfiris are, first and foremost, a threat to any and all other variants of Islam, whether Shia or Sunni.

http://www.unz.com/tsaker/the-future-of-islam-in-western-europe/

There is a sudden massing of hundreds of American military vehicles, tanks and supply trucks, on Jordan's border with Syria (drone pics here). Also the deal is set to massively increase weapons supply to Syrian Kurds, an effective fighting force, hated by Turkey. (Erdogan says Trump can still turn back from this.)

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-09/drone-images-expose-major-us-jordan-military-build-syrian-border

Who wants to be FBI Director? Let's see a show of hands!  Free sword-of-Damocles!

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-10/fbi-turmoil-over-comey-ouster-chaos-ensues-search-new-director-gets-underway

Wikileaks offers Comey a job in Washington office.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-10/wikileaks-offers-hire-james-comey

Barack Obama is paid $3.2 million for a 90 minute talk in Italy. What a lucky guy! Thanks for the news, Ray. (New term "pre-bribery" just means "guaranteed payoff for services rendered". This is public advertising for how profitable it is to serve the masters well.)

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-09/obama-pockets-32-million-speaking-gig-milan

Pat Buchanan, who worked in the White House the entire Nixon presidency, draws parallels between Nixon and Trump, who both feared and hated the CIA. Nixon went into the job fully prepared... There are differences.

http://buchanan.org/blog/nixon-trump-now-126940

Modern Monetary Theory, the Trillion $ platinum coin, Bernie Sanders, and Donald Trump... (Lincoln spent greenbacks into circulation. Global banking hated him with a vengeance.)

To a layperson, MMT can seem dizzyingly complex, but at its core is the belief that most of us have the economy backward. Conventional wisdom holds that the government taxes individuals and companies in order to fund its own spending. But the government—which is ultimately the source of all dollars, taxed or untaxed—pays or spends first and taxes later... “It’s a theory insofar as arithmetic is a theory.” “The contribution of MMT is not the discovery of new facts,” Galbraith says. “It’s a teaching core of things which are factually uncontroversial.” But its implications can be radically humane. What’s threatening to the establishment, Galbraith adds, “is that the narrative is very compelling.”

https://www.thenation.com/article/the-rock-star-appeal-of-modern-monetary-theory/

Pension cuts mandated by the Eurogroup are ruled illegal under Greek and European law (a minor formality...)

http://www.ekathimerini.com/218286/article/ekathimerini/news/court-finds-new-pension-cuts-to-be-unconstitutional-sources-say

Paid-in-Lies

My Fellow Slaves

Chained by Lies,

Here is the new introduction to a much-easier to-comprehend version of American history. War and Empire, The American Way of Life

Secretary of State Dean Acheson: “Thank God Korea came along.” 

Though Acheson himself had declared that Korea was outside of America’s “defensive perimeter,” warhawks in Washington and on Wall Street declared that the civil war between Korean factions on the other side of the planet imperiled the “free world.” What actually was at risk was the new militarized superstate, and the tax guaranteed profits to the corporations embedded in the war economy. The war that followed left 3 million Koreans and 37,000 US soldiers dead, threatened China with nuclear destruction, leading the Chinese to deploy their own nukes in short order.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/05/05/war-and-empire-the-american-way-of-life/

American Democracy, a Dead Man Walking, by Paul Craig Roberts, has an unusually frank quote from Vladimir Putin. Thanks Eleni.

"In the West, voters cannot change policies through elections, because the ruling elites control whoever is elected. Elections give the appearance of democracy, but voting does not change the policies that favor war and the elites. Therefore, the will of the people is impotent. People are experiencing that they and their votes have no influence on the conduct of affairs of the country. This makes them afraid, frusrated, and angry, a combination of emotions that is dangerous to the ruling elite, who in response organize the powers of the state against the people, while urging them with propaganda to support more wars."

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2017/05/02/american-democracy-dead-man-walking/

Peter Koenig states most clearly that we are slaves to this new world order. Slavehood 2017

"Independent thinking has become a crime, as it impedes the advancement of slavehood. Education is designed to kill individual thinking and the wide range of inventiveness – because it’s dangerous – for those who enslave and control us... Idiots are easily enslaved and exploited and sent to wars – to steal foreign resources to satisfy the greed of a few. We love to be cannon fodder, as we were told – enslaved – to believe that good patriots love to die for their country."

http://www.globalresearch.ca/slavehood-2017-social-chaos-and-global-warfare-puppet-leaders-greed-for-power-and-money/5588541

The Skin of Others in Your Game, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, explains why James Bond and Sherlock Holmes, and so many other popular heroic figures really needed to be single and unattached men, unconnected to vulnerable loved ones. They became able to consider threats and benefits to society with noble objectivity. 

It's not like that when you have a family. You could be influenced to take actions that will enable millions of humans to be murdered, because you cannot allow harm to come to your own family. Most of us have faced this in smaller ways.

https://medium.com/incerto/the-skin-of-others-in-your-game-3f51d8ccc3fb

Why a new Afghan Surge is a terrible idea (but not bad if you make war-money and control global resources, like heroin...)

Generations of American developers and soldiers intended to transform this austere landscape into a breadbasket and bastion of democratic values. Instead, they created the world’s largest opium poppy plantation, the heartland of the thriving Taliban-led insurgency... Afghanistan today remains the largest U.S. military foreign engagement. From the peak of about 100,000 boots on the ground during the Obama-era surge, there are still almost 10,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, plus up to 26,000 highly paid contractors for the Department of Defense and other agencies... Will Surge 2.0 be consequential, relevant, sustainable? Or will it be another futile chapter in an unwinnable war? (Rhetorical question, detailed here...)

http://www.politico.eu/article/donald-trump-afghanistan-surge-war-terrible-idea/

"Why We Should Be Concerned About Low Oil Prices", Gail Tverberg

Peak Oil production in the US was successfully predicted and dated by M. King Hubbert, probably the premier oil geologist in the US, in the mid 1950s, and came to pass around 1971, as predicted. Since the 1970s, when the US did suffer the obvious consequences of national oil depletion, the financial equations have changed defensively. Massive debt financing within global capitalism has become the stability mechanism to keep the oil coming. Financial arrangements have become the rate-limiting factor for now. As long as payments on the very-low-interest debts of oil companies are not defaulted, the oil will be pumped, even though, the drilling and exploration has mostly stopped. There will now be a couple of years lag before absolute production capacity begins declining. 

We have low oil prices, since global workers are also the global market, and their wages have been getting cut in real terms for the past 15 years. The top 10% can't buy enough, and credit cards are maxed out. 

An inevitable crisis of confidence will topple this global financial regime.

https://ourfiniteworld.com/2017/05/05/why-we-should-be-concerned-about-low-oil-prices/

The Great Climate Silence: We are on the Edge of the Abyss, but we ignore it...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/may/05/the-great-climate-silence-we-are-on-the-edge-of-the-abyss-but-we-ignore-it

"Good luck, Mr. Macron, you will need it", Editorial from The Guardian UK

[My editorial is that this youngest ever French President was the architect in charge of the neoliberal austerity measures the French hated so much, yet is nearly impossible to personally hate. He speaks in gently glowing circles of platitude. He is a Rothschild banking scion, with all the right credentials, so presents a Rothschild-veto in anything the House of Rothschild finds to be against their interests. He beat French-Nationalist, Marine LePen 65% to 35%, though a clear majority of the French electorate support nationalist policies. The left-nationalists were cut out of the 2-way election, and the highest ever proportion of French voters (12%) responded by giving blank or damaged ballots. This was also the lowest turnout since 1974. Macron has no party, so no parliamentarians. Parliamentary voting in about 6 weeks will be fractious. No national consensus is expected to emerge, but to whatever degree it does, Rothschild has the veto, and a sweet young spokesman for their interests.]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/may/07/the-guardian-view-on-the-french-election-good-luck-mr-macron-you-will-need-it

Greece can never pay it's debts, so why not admit it? (The reason presented here is that banking deals extracted huge profits from Greece, and from the first bail-out, then transferred the inevitable losses onto European taxpayers, "while banks-were-saved", which makes politicians to blame, and they cannot accept the blame until their personal futures are as secure as their partners in finance.)

https://capx.co/yet-another-eurofudge-will-prolong-greeces-suffering/

Bleeding Scapegoat

Waltzing On The Titanic

Remarking Openly,

Donald Trump had a pleasant meeting with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull:

"I shouldn't say this to our great gentleman and my friend from Australia, because you have better health care than we do," Trump continued. "We're going to have great health care very soon." (Australia does have a very good medical system.)

That's not the position of the Republican Party, but it is the position of Senator Sanders, who had these spontaneous remarks after laughing:

"Thank you, Mr. President. Let us move to a 'Medicare for all' system that does what every other major country on earth does: guarantee health care to all people at a fraction of the cost per capita what we spend," Sanders said after seeing the clip. "Thank you, Mr. President. We'll quote you on the floor of the Senate."

https://www.buzzfeed.com/claudiakoerner/president-trump-praised-australias-nationalized-health-care?utm_term=.jygJVQ3kX#.vjMeRwB52

Here is the rundown of what the AHCA accomplishes in it's current form. It eliminates mandates and taxes on health insurance (sighs of relief). It cuts coverage and cuts the Medicaid expansion plans as many areas are getting poorer. It might cost the federal government a little less in the long run, according to projections before it was revised. It doesn't actually "repeal" anything. It's dead in the Senate. The Senate has to make it's own Chimeracare.

Goldman Sachs dryly observes that the AHCA will take a long time to finalize, and will probably delay any tax-cut legislation into 2018.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-05/goldman-explains-what-repeal-obamacare-really-means

Emmanuel Macron, French Hillary Clinton, or more like Teflon Bill?

There was a leak of high resolution Macron documents of bank accounts in Bahamas and Cayman Islands, which appear authentic. There was also hacking of Macron's computer system, and social media has been tweeting it up. "Russians" say the Macron-campers. Can Macron lose a 20 point lead by Sunday? Does he really have a 20 point lead, like the polls say?

http://disobedientmedia.com/macron-document-leaker-releases-new-images-promises-more-information/

The slant on this article is that NGOs are good and Greek government is bad, which is not what I hear. The Greek government is relieving NGOs of responsibility for any refugee care in the next few months. The Greek authorities will get far less money than the NGOs for the care of asylum seekers, and are giving bonuses of cash and airline tickets home to those who will accept the inevitable deportation 2 weeks earlier. Reports on the ground are that Greeks of all stripes are giving better care, and the Greek government is accountable, where NGOs are not at all. NGOs bring in foreign nationals at great expense, supplies from afar, tents and porta-potties. How's that efficient?

https://euobserver.com/migration/137762

The EU has an international plan to thwart human smuggling across the Mediterranean this summer: 

China, Stop Making Those Inflatable Boats Everybody Uses!

There, that should fix it. 

http://www.ekathimerini.com/218126/article/ekathimerini/news/eu-wants-chinas-help-to-stop-boats-being-used-by-migrants

Russia says that those "safe zones" or regional ceasefire zones that are being negotiated in Syria will not be open to American and NATO military aircraft (nor presumably Israeli), Russia can say that since the US fired off 59 Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airbase in the desert, and 23 got there, while 36 got lost in the Bermuda Triangle (Electronic attacks are presumed, just like North Korea's missiles keep blowing up and crashing.)

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-zones-idUSKBN1810L5

It looks like this multilateral agreement to cease hostilities in the designated parts of Syria just went into effect.

https://www.rt.com/news/387251-syria-safe-zones-takes-effect/

The United States, under President George H.W. Bush adopted a secret policy of developing first-strike capability against Russia and China, then either using it, or forcing them to disarm under threat. President Clinton advanced that agenda with the Bosnian war, encroaching upon Russia, and that has not stopped. The George W. Bush (aka Cheney) Presidency turned all knobs to "11", and under Barack Obama the ability of US Submarine launched missiles to destroy Russian ICBMs was tripled by a high-tech accuracy-upgrade, allowing them to detonate just above the target, no matter the altitude. The Iranian ICBM threat was just an excuse to put anti-missiles close to Russia, and the North Korea threat gets anti ballistic missiles right up next to China, and also Russia now. Yes, billions of humans could die, but that's beside the point, isn't it?

http://www.globalresearch.ca/americas-top-scientists-confirm-u-s-goal-now-is-to-conquer-russia-disarming-enemies-with-a-surprise-nuclear-first-strike/5588524

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2017/05/03/n-korean-crisis-really/

Burnt Offering

May The Fourth Be With You

Droids They're Looking For,

Charles Hugh Smith: "Self-serving interests committed to protecting their power, wealth and income have destroyed our economic-political system's ability to self-correct."

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2017/05/the-elites-have-destroyed-status-quos.html

Michael Hudson on Steve Keen's book. It's not a long book.

"It is simple enough to show that the mathematics of compound interest lead the volume of debt to exceed the rate of GDP growth, thereby diverting more and more income to the financial sector as debt service...  Such payments to creditors leave less available to spend on goods and services."

"The business cycle itself is a financial cycle – that is, a cycle of the buildup and collapse of debt."

"Keen proposes a “Modern Debt Jubilee” that is essentially a swap of equity for debt. The intellectual pedigree for this policy to keep debt within the ability to pay was laid two centuries ago by Saint-Simon in France. His solution was for banks to take an equity position in their clients, so that payments to backers could rise or fall in keeping with the fortunes of the enterprise. Keen urges that this become the basis for future banking." [Hey, I recognize that. It's Islamic Banking!]

http://www.defenddemocracy.press/the-economics-of-the-future-by-michael-hudson/

So what can we call "Obamacare Lite"? Is it "Ryancare", "Trumpcare", "Republicare"?

It's as different from Obamacare as a Ford Pinto is from a Chevy Vega, but I'm not sure which is which. It hasn't passed the senate yet...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-04/watch-live-obamacare-vote-begins-first-major-trump-victory-or-another-epic-fail

The Senate is going to do it's own rewrite of Obamacare, so maybe a Pinto with a Vega engine in it. (It's too much to expect a Vega with a Pinto engine.) Anyway, it will all have to be "reconciled" into something else (Yugo?).

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-04/senate-write-its-own-obamacare-repeal-bill

In his final year in office Barack Obama's administration sought "unmasked" NSA dossiers on thousands of Americans. (Who can resist temptation in an election year?)

http://circa.com/politics/president-obamas-team-sought-nsa-intel-on-thousands-of-americans-during-the-2016-election

This is weird: Al Jazeera has filmed a false flag attack with chemical weapons on Syrian civilians, to be released this weekend, with social media coordination, and ordered by some film-enthusiast in Europe. I hope it's all spoiled now. (We presume this was done to a higher standard than the last sarin false-flag.)

https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201705041053273158-syria-chemical-attack-civilians-fake/

Moon of Alabama has update on Syrian war. What a mess! It's hard to keep up with all the sides. The first part of divide-and-conquer is sure going swell. 

Russia keeps calling moderate-rebels Al-Qaeda, when the US and Turkey don't want to, because then you have to say it's ok to kill them. 

Only Turkey wants to kill Kurds. Everybody else likes Kurds, because the gun-ladies scare Al-Qaeda. 

Nobody talks out loud about this war being about whose pipeline takes natural gas to Europe. Funny, isn't it? 

Russia suggests negotiations.

http://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/05/syria-summary-a-new-russian-proposal-and-a-battle-for-the-south.html#more

Hey, it looks like boycotting Israel is working a little bit. More and more people feel like it's not ok to be like Hitler, just because Hitler was like Hitler. Thanks Eleni.

https://www.sott.net/article/349666-Boycotting-works-Leaked-report-highlights-Israel-lobbys-anti-BDS-failures-and-backfires

North Korea outs Israeli nuclear weapons program, which the US studiously ignores, ever since LBJ was king. 

Double-standard much? Thanks Eleni.

https://www.sott.net/article/349651-DPRK-launches-nuclear-truth-bomb-Israel-has-illegal-nukes-is-protected-by-US

China is acting mad at North Korea, and North Korea is acting mad at China, and Trump is acting polite for a change. Russia is kind of quietly smiling and urging diplomacy. What's really happening? Is this theater? Weird. (Don't shoot!)

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-usa-russia-idUSKBN17Z0B7

Marine LePen says France will have a French Franc in 2 years if she is elected, but people can still use Euros. Europe can have lots of currencies. 

She said some other stuff, too. (I hope that Al-Jazeera special doesn't upstage french elections this Sunday. Maybe it will get postponed.)

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-le-pen-eu-idUSKBN17Y259

Emmanuel Macron files suit against Marine Le Pen for fake news she saw on the internet, and mentioned when she said she "hoped he was not discovered to have an offshore bank account". He's very hurt, of course...

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/05/macron-files-lawsuit-cyber-misinformation-170504174724112.html

The EU orders Austria, German, Denmark and Sweden to stop controlling their borders. (OK, so now what? What's the bad thing when they don't stop?)

https://mishtalk.com/2017/05/03/eu-orders-austria-germany-denmark-sweden-norway-to-stop-border-controls-or-what/

Imperial Walker

Apocalypse Pretty Soon

Students of History,

Graham Hancock, Archaeology researcher, explains the Younger Dryas Period, an ice age, which followed the collision of multiple large meteors with Earth's northern ice fields 12,800 years ago, wiping out advanced human civilization, most humans, and engendering 200 oral traditions of apocalypse, like Atlantis, and The Great Flood. Native Americans kept a very good oral history. Hancock has been met with derision for 20 years (it's easier), but is now validated, as in the story I came across and sent out last night. He gets to speak for himself here. I'm going to go buy the book Magicians of the Gods. 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3230040/Best-selling-author-Graham-Hancock-argues-cosmic-explosion-soon-strike-Earth.html

The Taurid meteor stream is the result of a comet breaking up, after being captured by the gravity of our solar system. Some of the big core pieces caused the apocalypse 12,800 years ago. We don't usually get the center of the stream coming at us, very rarely, 3000 years apart, or so. Coming in 2030. Smaller pieces hit sometimes...

"In the early morning of June 30, 1908, a huge fireball exploded in the sky above Siberia with the force of a 20-megaton nuclear bomb, leveling 400 square miles of remote forest around the Tunguska River. The glow lit up the sky as far away as Western Europe. The Tunguska object, Clube says, was a 150-foot comet fragment--one of the Taurids... The moon appears to have been pounded again by the Taurids as recently as 1975, when seismometers left behind by Apollo astronauts picked up the impact of a huge swarm of boulders. The onslaught started on June 22."

http://discovermagazine.com/1992/jun/deathinjune69

Earth Is Not Prepared For A Surprise Asteroid Strike:  NASA Warns ‘There Is Not A Lot We Can Do About It – At The Moment — Plan Is To Save Planet-Earth With An Asteroid Re-Direct Mission — But, May Not Be Operational Till 2025-2030  (Well, that might be helpful.)

http://fortunascorner.com/2016/12/15/earth-is-not-prepared-for-a-surprise-asteroid-strike-nasa-warns-there-is-not-a-lot-we-can-do-about-it-at-the-moment-plan-is-to-save-planet-earth-with-an-asteroid-re-direct-mission-but-may/

Mortal Earthling

Previous Human Extinction

Reincarnated,

It really looks as though history is all different again, due to a giant comet that smacked North America 13,000 years ago, causing and ice age, woolly mammoth extinction, and the near extinction of advanced human societies, particularly around the mediterranean. There has previously been speculation about what caused that human genetic bottleneck, of some few thousand who successfully repopulated the world, but now it seems to have been the natural version of nuclear armageddon.

There was another group of people already in North America, and some of them did survive and passed down the oral history. A small group of people who sustained the old knowledge were able to correctly depict the astronomic event 11,000 years ago on finely carved stone, at Gobekli Tepe, near Turkey's border with Syria. The positions of the constellations spell out the correct date of our last extinction. 

The Taurid Meteor Stream which done this evil deed has long, long passed away from our fair planet, but is still tracked by astronomers. Theoretically it has so much big, rocky space junk that it could do this again some day, when it comes back around. We don't need to worry about that, because it's not for another 13 years, 2030. Whew!  (second link better pictures only)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4457530/Mini-Ice-Age-wiped-cvilisation-13-000-years-ago.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/01/150120-gobekli-tepe-oldest-monument-turkey-archaeology/

America's Financial War Strategy (as seen from China) The outsourcing of manufacturing by the empire is fine as long as it can flood the world with dollars for stuff, then crash the foreign economies and buy up their factories, and rinse, and repeat. This article postulates that we are in the last cycle of all that. China will replace the $US with the old global reserve currency, during the next financial crisis. China has a lot of the old currency, they say, and it all came from space, from meteors and stuff... gold. Thanks Eleni.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/americas-financial-war-strategy/5587886

Japan seeks to restore it's sovereignty (by making peace with Russia. It's a serious ongoing negotiation. Probably feeds right into this big reset, huh?)

http://orientalreview.org/2017/05/01/germany-of-asia-looking-to-restore-its-sovereignty/

More analysis of the American tomahawk missile attack on Syria last month is here. It lays out something I had really been thinking about, but not addressed so much. 59 Tomahawk missiles got fired at a Syrian airbase, and 23 got there, confirmed by aerial photography, and flights took off the next day... What happened to the other 36? This article says the Russian air defenses just dropped them, probably without missiles, just electronics, but not sure. This was a massed attack, meant to overwhelm air defenses. It didn't. Good thing it wasn't a bunch of guys in those new F-35s, huh? This analysis is toward the end of a long article. Thanks Eleni.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/what-are-they-hiding-about-the-usa-attack-on-syria-the-break-up-of-syria/5587676

Putin and Trump have another phone conversation and agree to work together some on Syrian and North Korean situations. They might meet this summer, around the G-20 meeting July 7-8, maybe... (It's about damned time.)

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-02/trump-putin-hold-phone-call-discuss-north-korea-syria-agree-set-meeting

Jean-Claude Juncker and Theresa May had a nice dinner at Downing Street, spoiled only by their attempts to talk about the start of Brexit negotiations. Ms May dismayed Mr Juncker, convincing him that she was actually from one of Dr Who's parallel universes, or at least another galaxy. It appears to be a coy form of hardball. "Let's talk about everything I want first. OK, now time to talk about what you want, but we can't, because I can't tie the hands of the next government, to be elected this summer, which will be me and my friends again." (I think they are waiting for something to blow up and then it will all get done in a panic.)

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/01/how-junckers-downing-street-dinner-turned-sour

"An electric auto will convert 5-10% of the energy in natural gas into motion. A normal vehicle will convert 20-30% of the energy in gasoline into motion. That's 3 or 4 times more energy recovered with an internal combustion vehicle than an electric vehicle."  (It's an easy choice, as long as there is liquid fuel and personal cars, but a corporate fleet of driverless electric taxis might be what's for dinner, with resistance-is-futile for an appetizer, probably by 2030 :-)

http://www.nov79.com/elvp.html

Warming Globally

Divine Right Of Banks

Landless Peasants,

“The King can do no wrong.” —William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England

“When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.” —Ex-President Richard Nixon, interview with David Frost

A person or group of people who satisfy Blackstone’s criterion for ultimate sovereign power—the power to commit crimes with impunity—can’t exist in a nation where the law reigns supreme.

The question at bar is why the U.S. Department of Justice has failed to prosecute any too-big-to-fail banks or—more importantly—their bankers, even for admitted crimes. It’s a crucial question, because after eight straight years of unremitting prosecutorial failure, it looks very much as if a select group of top banks can, in fact, do no wrong. If that’s the case, then our constitutional republic isn’t merely in trouble. It's dead.

 Legally, the TBTF banks are indistinguishable from the King, since the power to commit crimes with impunity swallows all other sovereign powers; such a power isn’t even supposed to exist in the U.S., and yet it does. Moreover, since there can’t be two kings in a kingdom, the entire U.S. government, from the president on down, is just one of the King’s men under this formulation of power. The real job of the U.S. government, then, isn’t to represent the will of the people at all, it’s to do the King’s bidding. A nation that isn’t governed by law is governed by instead by a king—it’s one or the other—and the president’s inferiority to such an above-the-law sovereign was confirmed over 40 years ago with Nixon’s ouster. The president, unlike the King, answers to the law (despite Nixon's opinion). 

[Thanks Eleni. The "king" is the corporate body of western banking, as personified in all bankers who conform to the objectives of the oligarchy. Airtight case. No court will actually try it. "The king's men" are everywhere.]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gK3s5j7PgA

Jim Kunstler sees this: "I live in a corner of Flyover Red America where you can easily read these conditions on the landscape —... You can read it in the bodies of the people in the new town square, i.e. the supermarket: people prematurely old, fattened and sickened by bad food made to look and taste irresistible to con those sunk in despair, a deadly consolation for lives otherwise filled by empty hours, trash television, addictive computer games, and their own family melodramas concocted to give some narrative meaning to lives otherwise bereft of event or effort.  These are people who have suffered their economic and social roles in life to be stolen from them. They do not work at things that matter. They have no prospects for a better life — and, anyway, the sheer notion of that has been reduced to absurd fantasies of Kardashian luxury, i.e. maximum comfort with no purpose other than to enable self-dramatization. And nothing dramatizes a desperate life like a drug habit. It concentrates the mind, as Samuel Johnson once remarked, like waiting to be hanged."

http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-national-blues/

"Economic Reality: Bottom 50% of Americans No Longer Matter", Mish Shedlock (and growing percentage...)

https://mishtalk.com/2017/04/30/economic-reality-bottom-50-of-americans-no-longer-matter/

"Escaping Poverty Requires almost 20 years with Nearly Nothing Going Wrong" (Know anybody likely to pull that off? Hey, when would you have kids?)

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/economic-inequality/524610/

The argument for Medicare-for-all, yet again. (Notice that the amount the government is already paying into the for-profit system is already more than is paid by all of our peers like Canada, France, England, Spain, Australia and Japan for their entire systems, which are rated so much higher.)

"The government already underwrites 60 percent of all health costs, much of it to subsidize the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, while also partially or completely funding congressional, VA and public employee health coverage."

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/04/30/health-care-reform-commercial-multi-payer-vs-public-single-payer-health-insurance

Republican politicians are increasingly confident that they have the votes to "overturn Obamacare", by gutting th part that makes insurance companies cover people's medical conditions. That can cut costs, without cutting into insurance company profits, which would kill everything... Wednesday is the day. Next, it will be possible to move on to the budget and those tax cuts for the top 10%. Eat healthy!

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-01/third-time-charm-white-house-thinks-it-has-votes-healthcare-plans-wednesday-vote

David Stockman says Trump tax plan is (brain) Dead on Arrival.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-01/stockman-slams-trumps-dead-arrival-tax-plan-warns-wall-streets-delusional-believing-

Erdogan: "Turkey and US can wipe out ISIL in Raqqa (if Turkey may also wipe out Kurds in Syria, without restriction, now that ISIL is failing us)". 

Sultan Erdogan will meet with Puppet Trump this week for high level ingratiations.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/erdogan-turkey-wipe-isil-raqqa-170429112610087.html

"The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) continued the anti-ISIL Euphrates Rage Operation in Western Raqqa and managed to drive the terrorists out of more neighborhoods in al-Tabaqa city, killing over 40 of them... According to latest reports, around 40% of Tabaqa city has been brought under Kurdish control with just a few hundred ISIL militants left in its Northern sector and around the city center."

http://en.alalam.ir/news/1960691

American troops and armored vehicles drive into northern Syria. That's an invasion, right?  

http://www.globalresearch.ca/video-us-armored-vehicles-arrive-in-northern-syria-is-it-an-invasion/5587792

"Russia has supported a Chinese initiative in the UNSC intended to stabilize the situation on the Korean peninsula. It calls on the North to refrain from missile and nuclear testing, while the US and South Korea should halt military drills in the area." 

“In this context, the Russian Federation supported a Chinese proposal for a ‘double suspension’ (Pyongyang is to stop missile and nuclear tests and the US and South Korean militaries are to halt drills near North Korea) as a starting point for political negotiations.” [

This reasonable proposition must not be tolerated!]

https://www.rt.com/news/386559-north-korea-unsc-russia-china/

Yanis Varoufakis (who knows) advises Theresa May to "avoid negotiating with the EU at all costs". Just decide and do it. You will never get anything except tricks and traps and betrayal and strung out. Is PM May, a "stay" supporter, really the right chmpion for this contest?

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/798084/theresa-may-yanis-varoufakis-brexit-eu-avoid-negotiations-greece-finance-minister

Mish Shedlock says the same thing, based on his analysis. "There is absolutely no reason the UK should start a negotiation given the repeated EU demands. Once again, on Thursday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel repeated the EU’s “not reversible” position."

https://mishtalk.com/2017/04/28/brexit-negotiations-why-bother/

(New-New or just Good-Old) Labor Party advances platform for worker's rights in the UK, what it used to stand for a generation and more ago, before Tony Blair.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/uk/labour-vows-to-end-rigged-economy-with-new-employment-rights-35666971.html

Tony Blair: "Labor can win at any point that it wants to get back to winning ways." That is exquisitely clear code coming from that man. "Betray, Betray, Betray!"

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/30/tony-blair-labour-can-win-andrew-rawnsley-brexit-election

Jenny in the Spring Garden, Happy May Day! ("Workers of the World Unite! You have nothing to Lose but Your Chains")

Tomato Economist