Posts
Recovery?
Not for most.
Let's look at the data.
We have an economic recovery, allegedly, one ongoing since June, 2009. Tell that to the millions of “discouraged workers” who have been unable to find a job, have given up looking for nonexistent jobs, and are not counted as among the unemployed as measured by the fake 5.3% rate of unemployment.
The stock market, not too far below its highs, is used as evidence of recovery. However, the stock market is supported by companies buying back their own shares and by the liquidity that the Federal Reserve has poured into the financial system. Dan Strumpet reported in the "Wall Street Journal" that a mere six companies account for more than all of the gain in market-capitalization in the S&P 500. How’s that? We have a recovery in which a mere six companies participate — Amazon, Google, Apple, Facebook, Gilead, and Walt Disney Company.
Sounds like a rip-roaring recovery.
In the second quarter of this year the US economy contracted by 1.4%. Second quarter durable goods orders, minus commercial aircraft orders which are placed years ahead and do not reflect the state of the present economy, are in annual decline. Second quarter new home sales fell 7.3%. And Wall Street still hypes hope and recovery.
Spy vs. Spy?
Forgive me "Mad Magazine."
Jonathan Pollard, a paid spy for Israel described by Michael D. Shear as “one of the country’s most notorious spies,” has been pardoned from his life sentence. It strikes me as hypocritical for the US government to sentence anyone to prison for spying when the government itself spies on everyone everywhere. All Americans including members of the House and Senate, congressional staff, military officers, foreign governments including the leaders of Washington’s closest allies, and foreign businesses are spied upon. No one is exempt from Washington’s spying.
Washington claims that its worldwide spying does no harm. So how did the very limited spying of one person — Pollard — a civilian employee of Naval intelligence do so much harm as to warrant a life sentence? What some of us would like to see is a life sentence for NSA.
What disturbs me about the case is that it is Pollard, who spied for a foreign country, who is released. In contrast, Manning and Snowden who spied for the American people are locked away, Manning in a federal prison and Snowden in his Russian exile.
Julian Assange, who merely did his job as a journalist and made available to newspapers documents leaked to him, is confined to the Ecuadoran embassy in London.
It seems to me that if Pollard who spied for Israel can be set free, so ought to be Manning, Snowden, and Assange who spied for the American people and reported the illegal activities of the US government and the dangerous impact of Washington’s illegal activities on the liberty of Americans. Pollard is a hero to Israel, not to America, and it is Pollard who is released. Manning, Snowden, and Assange are heroes to America, and they continue to be confined.
More applause for Obama's corporate buddy choices?
Not.
Group Seeks to Expose Cozy Ties Between US Trade Rep and Wall Street
July 29, 2015
U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman is a former senior executive at Citigroup and received a "golden parachute" worth more than $4 million upon leaving the large financial institution to go into government. (Photo: US Institute of Peace/flickr/cc)
'Americans deserve to know what Froman has been privately saying to these big banks.'
Citing his cozy ties to Wall Street banks, a group dedicated to exposing corruption and corporate influence in Washington, D.C. has submitted an official Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all correspondence between U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and the 10 largest U.S. financial institutions.
The FOIA request demands access to or copies of emails and other written communications between Froman, the country's top trade negotiator, and banks including JP Morgan Chase & Co., Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Citigroup.
Froman is a former senior executive at Citigroup and received a "golden parachute" worth more than $4 million upon leaving the large financial institution to go into government.
Rootstrikers, the grassroots organization behind the FOIA request, has said that because corporate giveaways like the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) pose a threat to robust financial regulation in general — and the U.S. financial reforms implemented after the financial crisis in specific — "Americans deserve to know what Froman has been privately saying to these big banks."
Yeah.
Those mink freers are pretty scary.
Round'em up!
Dylann Roof Is Not a “Terrorist” — But Animal Rights Activists Who Free Minks From Slaughter Are
The FBI on Friday announced the arrests in Oakland of two animal rights activists, Joseph Buddenberg and Nicole Kissane, and accused the pair of engaging in “domestic terrorism.” This comes less than a month after the FBI director said he does not consider Charleston Church murderer Dylann Roof a terrorist.” The activists’ alleged crimes: “They released thousands of minks from farms around the country and vandalized various properties.” That’s it. Now they’re being prosecuted and explicitly vilified as “terrorists,” facing 10-year prison terms.
Buddenberg and Kissane [were] scheduled to appear [Tuesday] morning in a federal court in San Francisco for a hearing on bail conditions, while arraignment is set for early September. The indictment comes just days before the scheduled start of the Animal Rights National Conference, the largest and most important annual gathering of activists. The DOJ did exactly the same thing in July of last year: Shortly before the start of the 2014 conference, they arrested two activists on federal “terrorism” charges for freeing minks and foxes from a fur farm. The multiple activists and lawyers who spoke to "The Intercept" since Friday’s arrests are adamant that these well-timed indictments are designed to intimidate activists at the conference and more broadly to chill campaigns to defend animal rights.
Did you attend your local Bernie Sanders meeting this evening?
Why not?
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
Our betters have decided our future.
Again.
Get ready.
It ain't pretty.
Unless you're one of them.
As Elites Aim To Finalize Secret 'Profit Over People' Trade Deal, An Alarm Sounds
July 29, 2015
Common Dreams
Trade ministers will be met in Maui with a colorful demonstration against secret corporate agreement
. . . . Humanitarian aid organization Doctors Without Borders declared last week that the TPP is poised to be the "most damaging trade agreement ever for global health." If approved, the accord would "strengthen, lengthen and create new patent and regulatory monopolies for pharmaceutical products that will raise the price of medicines and reduce the availability of price-lowering generic competition," the group warned.
Public Citizen said of the talks in Maui: "Whether or not any real deal is made, a 'breakthrough' likely will be announced. But for whom would it be a breakthrough?"
Trade ministers are gathering this week at the The Westin Maui Resort and Spa for what could be the final round of negotiations. (Photo: Westin Maui Resort and Spa)
And you thought bloody tales were déclassé.
Hi Dick!
July 27, 2015
Making Money From Their Blood: Cheney's Former War-Profiteering Company Is Suing Veterans It Poisoned in Iraq
by Abby Zimet
Proving there is no level of low Dick Cheney and his cronies will not go, Halliburton-linked, scum-sucking defense contractor KBR is suing 12 Iraq veterans who had the audacity to seek and win $85 million in damages for the cancer they got from burn pit smoke while guarding a toxic water treatment plant for KBR - a company which, the jury ruled, acted with "reckless and outrageous indifference to a highly unreasonable risk of harm" to them.
The legal battle began when the veterans, part of a contingent of 300 Oregon members of the National Guard, were sent to Iraq in 2003 by KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton, which was run by former VP and current war criminal Cheney.
The Guardsmen were tasked with providing security at Qarmat Ali water treatment plant. They were conveniently not told the site was full of the powerful corrosive hexavalent chromium, a highly toxic orange-yellow crystalline powder linked to lung cancer and breathing problems; it is banned in the U.S. but was omnipresent at the plant, stored in bags and drifting loose, sometimes visibly on soldiers' dinners.
When they started having breathing and other health problems, their KBR bosses said they had "sand allergies" and not to worry. When the health issues kept escalating, a KBR safety manager finally shut the plant down.
Back home and increasingly sick, 12 of the Guardsmen sued the company; another 21 are reportedly waiting to join them. In November 2012, a Portland jury found KBG negligent and awarded $85 million to the soldiers, ruling KBR showed "conscious indifference to (their) health, safety and welfare."
The decision was celebrated by corporate watchdogs as an unprecedented call for accountability, and by the ailing, wheezing veterans as "a little bit of justice." It sent the message, said a relieved Aaron St. Clair, that, "We're not disposable...People are not going to make money from our blood."
But the ever-greedy KBR didn't want to have to account for their behavior during a war that netted them $39 billion in profits, more than any other defense contractor; when he left as head of Halliburton in 2000, Cheney himself had earned $12.5 million, with $39 million more in stock options.
KBR appealed the ruling, which was overturned on a bizarre technicality that found, not that KBR hadn't poisoned people, but that Oregon veterans had to sue the company in their home state of Texas.
Not content with that questionable legal victory, KBR took their corporate bullying and other scorched-earth tactics to a whole new level by filing a motion seeking $850,000 in legal fees from the sick veterans whose painful and likely dramatically shortened lives they've already ravaged.
The kicker: Even if they lose on appeal, KBR will likely get off scot-free thanks to an indemnity clause in their contract with the Defense Department, which would be held liable for any corporate malfeasance. Meaning that, once again, taxpayers would be left to bail out another massive amoral corporation guilty of greed, gross and in this case fatal negligence, and the blithe ruination of many lives.
As one critic puts it, "By burying these veterans in litigation and possibly crushing debt, they will have poisoned U.S. veterans, on the U.S. government’s dime, and have gotten away with it." In an outraged letter to the Defense Department, Democratic Oregon lawmakers likewise protested KBR's extortion attempts with the understatement of the decade: "Our soldiers have a right to expect better."
See below for evidence for those who believe that the phony-baloney expert Doogie Howser-type-serious-investigator doesn't exist in nature . . . .
George Alan Rekers (born July 11, 1948) is an American psychologist and ordained Southern Baptist minister.[2] He is emeritus professor of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine.[1][3]
Rekers has a Ph.D from University of California, Los Angeles and has been a research fellow at Harvard University, a professor and psychologist for UCLA and the University of Florida, and department head at Kansas State University. In 1983 Rekers was on the founding board of the Family Research Council, a non-profit Christian lobbying organization, and he is a former officer and scientific advisor of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH),[4][5][6] an organization offering conversion therapy intended to convert homosexuals to heterosexuality. Rekers has testified in court that homosexuality is destructive, and against parenthood by gay and lesbian people in a number of court cases involving organizations and state agencies working with children.[2]
In May 2010 Rekers employed a male prostitute as a travel companion for a two-week vacation in Europe.[7][8][9] Rekers denied any inappropriate conduct and suggestions that he was gay. The male escort told CNN he had given Rekers "sexual massages" while traveling together in Europe.[10][11] Rekers subsequently resigned from the board of NARTH.[12]
Personal life, education and academic career
Rekers is married with children.[13]
Rekers received his B.A. in psychology from Westmont College in 1969. He later received his M.A. and Ph.D. in psychology from University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1971 and 1972, respectively.[1] As part of his doctoral studies at UCLA, Rekers led an experimental study which used behavioral treatment to discourage "deviant sex-role behaviors in a male child".[14][15] The study's published results stated that the "treatment intervention produced a profound change" in the subject, a boy treated from the age of 4 years 11 months.[14]
In 2011, Anderson Cooper 360° featured a story about the fate of Kirk Murphy, a child Rekers states that he cured in many of his books. Murphy's siblings and mother state that the therapy ultimately had lasting damage to the boy and led to him growing up to be a man who grappled constantly with his homosexuality before committing suicide in 2003 at the age of 38.[16][17]
Rekers also holds an MBA in executive management from Southern Wesleyan University and Th.D. from the University of South Africa.[18]
From 1972 to 1973, Rekers worked as a research fellow and visiting scholar for the Center for Behavioral Sciences at Harvard University. After completing his Ph.D., Rekers was an assistant research psychologist and adjunct assistant professor of psychology at UCLA from 1974 to 1977. Rekers joined the University of Florida College of Medicine in 1977 and became the chief psychologist at the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry as well as an associate professor of psychiatry, clinical psychology, and pediatrics. In 1980, Rekers became head and a tenured professor at the Department of Family and Child Development at Kansas State University; he left in 1985.[1]
Scholarly work
Rekers has published numerous journal articles on gender roles among children,[19] with articles on "cross-gender identified boys" and "child gender disturbances".[20][21][22] His work has been criticized by other scholars for reinforcing sex-role stereotypes and for reliance on dubious rationales for therapeutic intervention (e.g. parents' worries that their children might become homosexuals).[23][24]
Rekers refers in his academic work to "the positive therapeutic effects of religious conversion for curing transsexualism" and "the positive therapeutic effect of a church ministry to repentant homosexuals."[25] Judith Butler describes this work as "intensely polemical", giving "highly conservative political reasons for strengthening the diagnosis [of "gender identity disorder"] so that the structures that support normalcy can be strengthened."[26]
Rekers credits himself for developing a method of assessing gender behavior in children's play in 1972.[27]
Views on the family
Rekers' views on family life were the focus of a major controversy in Florida in 2002 when then-governor Jeb Bush appointed Jerry Regier to the post of head of the Florida Department of Children and Families with responsibility for child welfare. Shortly after the announcement of Regier's appointment, it was disclosed that in 1989 the California-based Coalition on Revival had published a fundamentalist tract titled "The Christian World View of the Family" under the names of Regier and Rekers, which condemned working mothers as being in "bondage" and argued that the government should have no right to place children in protective custody except in cases of extreme abuse or neglect.
The tract's authors also "affirm that Biblical spanking may cause temporary and superficial bruises or welts that do not constitute child abuse" and "deny that the Bible countenances any other definition of the family, such as the sharing of a household by homosexual partners, and that society's laws should be modified in any way to broaden the definition of family."[28] The tract was condemned by Democrats; Bush told the media that Regier "doesn't share those extreme views."[29] Regier survived the controversy and served as DCF head from 2002 to the end of Jeb Bush's term in 2007.[30]
Rekers is a practicing Southern Baptist, and credits the work of C.S. Lewis, particularly his writings on gender relations, with influencing his religious and social views.[31]
Views on homosexuality
Rekers has attracted attention for his views on homosexuality, which have been promoted in a number of forums and court cases. He asserts that homosexuality is a "gender disturbance" that can be corrected through 18 to 22 months of weekly therapy during childhood and adolescence.
Mark Pietrzyk, of the gay group the Log Cabin Republicans, has stated that Rekers' method uses aversion therapy – a practice opposed by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) – that punishes "nonconforming" behavior such as swaggering in girls or limp wrists in boys and rewards "conforming" behavior such as girls playing with dolls and boys playing basketball.[32]
A number of authorities working in the relevant fields reject Reeker's basic premise utterly; a publication from the APA states "The idea that homosexuality is a mental disorder or that the emergence of same-sex attraction and orientation among some adolescents is in any way abnormal or mentally unhealthy has no support among any mainstream health and mental health professional organizations."[33] (Printing and distribution of that publication was with the support of the American Counseling Association, the Interfaith Alliance, and the National Education Association.[34])
According to Rekers himself, he spends much of his time with boys whose peers regard them as "sissy" and "effeminate" with the goal of reversing those traits and "help[ing] these children to become better adapted to themselves and to their environment."[35]
The APA's opposition to his methods led to him resigning from the organization.[35]
Rekers has appeared in court in several cases as an expert witness testifying on matters concerning homosexuality. His testimony has been strongly criticized by a number of parties including trial judges; the American Civil Liberties Union has asserted that his personal beliefs regarding homosexuality interfere with his ability to give an unbiased professional opinion on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual (LGBT) topics, including gay adoption.[36] Legal experts have discussed whether his involvement with a male prostitute in 2010 could render his testimony unreliable, possibly affecting the outcome of pending cases in Florida and California.[37]
Boy Scouts of America hearing, 1998
Rekers testified before the Washington, D.C. Human Rights Commission on behalf of the Boy Scouts of America in 1998 in defense of the group's policy on excluding homosexuals, arguing that it was justified because admission of homosexuals "would legitimize the value of homosexual behavior in the eyes of many of the Boy Scouts ... There would be more homosexual conduct or behavior by the boys in such troops."[35] He has acknowledged that his views are heavily influenced by religious concerns; as a member of the Southern Baptists, he believes that the city of Sodom was destroyed by God as a punishment for allowing homosexuality and that active homosexuals face "eternal separation from God", i.e., perpetuity in hell.[35]
Arkansas gay adoption case, 2004
Rekers was an expert witness in a 2004 case involving gay adoption in Arkansas, which had banned LGBT people from adopting in 1999. He argued that "it would be in the best interest of foster children to be placed in a heterosexual home" because the majority of people in the country disapproved of homosexual behaviour, putting further stress on children who were already likely to suffer from psychological disorders.
According to Rekers, "That disapproval filters down to children [who] will express disapproval in more cruel, insensitive ways" toward a child being parented by a gay person. In cross-examination, Rekers acknowledged that he believed that homosexuality is sinful and that the Bible is the infallible word of God.[38] His testimony was rebutted by Dr. Michael Lamb, a psychiatrist, who stated that there was no scientific evidence for the assertion that homosexuals were worse parents than heterosexuals.[39]
The trial judge, Pulaski County Circuit Court judge Timothy Fox, ruled against the state of Arkansas in December 2004. He was strongly critical of Rekers' testimony, describing it as "extremely suspect" and said that Rekers "was there primarily to promote his own personal ideology." Rekers responded by denouncing the trial as "utterly corrupt."[40][41]
Following the case, Rekers billed the Arkansas Department of Health and Human Services a sum of $165,000 for his testimony, an amount that far exceeded what the state had anticipated. He later increased the bill to $200,000 with the addition of late fees and other charges for preparing paperwork. The unpaid bill led to two years of legal wrangling that was finally settled out of court with a $60,000 payment.[42]
Florida gay adoption case, 2008
Main article: In re: Gill
In 2008, Rekers was an expert witness in In re: Gill, a case defending Florida's gay adoption ban. He presented testimony asserting that homosexuals are more likely to suffer from depression, substance abuse, and emotional problems.[43] Citing what he called "God's moral laws," he asserted that individual homosexuals are "manipulated by leaders of the homosexual revolt" to the detriment of those suffering this "sexual perversion."[44] He also asserted that Native Americans would make unsuitable foster parents, asserting that they suffered from a high risk of alcohol abuse and psychiatric disorders.[45]
Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Cindy Lederman ruled against the state. In her decision, she said "Dr. Rekers’ testimony was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence. Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions that are not consistent with the science.
Based on his testimony and demeanor at trial, the court cannot consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy."[40] It later emerged that Rekers had been paid nearly $120,000 for his testimony on behalf of the state, which had been solicited specifically by Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum. The attorney general wrote in 2007: "Our attorneys handling this case have searched long and hard for other expert witnesses with comparable expertise to Dr. Rekers and have been unable to identify any who would be available for this case." However, his choice of witness was criticized by Nadine Smith of the gay-rights organization Equality Florida: "Rekers is part of a small cadre of bogus pseudo scientists that charge these exorbitant fees to peddle information they know has been discredited time and time again. And people like McCollum will pay top dollar for it. There's a reason why he can't find credible sources. Because credible people don't believe this ban should exist."[46]
Third District Court of Appeal State of Florida, stated in the decision: "Dr. Cochran (Professor of Epidemiology and Statistics at the University of California in Los Angeles) also testified about errors in scientific methodology and reporting in Dr. Rekers’ study, stating that Dr. Rekers had failed to present an objective review of the evidence on those subjects. Cochran concluded that Dr. Rekers’ work did not meet established standards in the field. Another expert, Dr. Peplau (Professor of Psychology at the University of California in Los Angeles), testified that Dr. Rekers had omitted in his review of the scientific literature “other published, widely cited studies on the stability of actual relationships over time.”[47]
Organizational affiliations
Family Research Council
In 1983 Rekers was on the founding board of the Family Research Council, a non-profit Christian lobbying organization, along with James Dobson and Armand Nicholi Jr, but the organization reported in 2010 he has not been associated with them for more than a decade.[48]
NARTH
Until May 11, 2010, Rekers was listed as an advisor and officer with the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality;[4][5] as of June 4, 2010,[6] these listings have been removed from the NARTH website. NARTH is an association which promotes the acceptance of conversion therapy intended to change homosexuals into heterosexuals, contrary to the advice of mainstream professional associations such as the American Psychiatric Association and American Psychological Association. On May 11, 2010, NARTH announced that Rekers had resigned from its board.[12]
FactsAboutYouth.com
FactsAboutYouth.com is a website designed to give educators information for teaching youth about sexual orientation. Rekers is listed by name as being a director in the development of the resource through a subcommittee of the American College of Pediatricians (not to be confused with the American Academy of Pediatrics). The National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality, an organization for which Rekers was an officer, is also listed as managing the website.[49] A contributor for the organization Truth Wins Out characterized this website as a "phony medical group attempting to peddle anti-gay propaganda to schools."[50]
Web sites
Rekers operated web sites including TeenSexToday.com ("my blog on teen sex")[51] and an evangelical team ministry called InterAct International Inc.[52]
"Rent boy" allegations
The Miami New Times reported on May 4, 2010, that three weeks previously, Rekers had been photographed at Miami International Airport with a twenty-year-old "rent boy" who was using the name "Lucien" (later identified as Jo-Vanni Roman).
Roman was available for hire through the Rentboy.com website. Rekers acknowledged hiring Roman for the 10-day European vacation as a "travel assistant" and denies any impropriety. He said that Roman was there to help carry his luggage since he had surgery recently and was unable to carry it himself, although the photograph clearly showed Rekers lifting his own luggage.[8][53]
Rekers was quoted as commenting, "If you talk with my travel assistant ... you will find I spent a great deal of time sharing scientific information on the desirability of abandoning homosexual intercourse, and I shared the Gospel of Jesus Christ with him in great detail."[54] The incident was covered by media outlets and TV shows worldwide.[54][55][56][57][58][59]
In subsequent interviews, Roman said Rekers had paid him to provide nude massages daily:[10][60] "'Jo-vanni' in news reports, has told various media outlets that he gave Rekers daily massages in the nude during the trip, which included genital touching."[61]
He also talked about how he believed that Rekers was, in fact, homosexual: "It's a situation," Roman said, "where he's going against homosexuality when he is a homosexual." According to the "New Times," Roman "made it clear they met through Rentboy.com",[8] and denied that he had been hired to carry luggage;[60] The Times reported that Rekers "hired a companion from a website called Rentboy.com that offers clients a wide range of choices, from 'rentboy' and 'sugar daddy' to 'masseur'."[54] On the May 6, 2010 episode of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart pointed out that Roman is looking on in the photograph, while Rekers is seen handling his own luggage.[62][63]
On May 7, the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality announced that they took the accusations against Rekers seriously, would be carrying out an inquiry into these events, and expressed sympathy to the individuals and families involved.[12] As of June 4, 2010, NARTH seems to have removed this statement from the NARTH website. Following the first report about Rekers, on May 8, 2010, New York magazine reported that another individual said that Rekers had hired him in a similar capacity in 1992.[64][65] On May 11, 2010, NARTH announced that Rekers had resigned from its board.[12]
On May 12, Christianity Today reported that Rekers stated on his personal website that he had interviewed several people for the role of travel assistant, and was not aware of his assistant's internet advertisements.[66] He e-mailed them saying "I confessed to the Lord and to my family that I was unwise and wrong to hire this travel assistant after knowing him only one month before the trip", saying he was unaware that his "travel assistant" was "more than a person raised in a Christian home".
Rekers explained his regrets for the harm caused by his "unwise decision", and that he was being advised by "an experienced pastor and counselor from my church, so I can more fully understand my weaknesses and prevent this kind of unwise decision-making in the future". On his resignation from NARTH he said "I am not gay and never have been."[66] The scandal became popular fodder for media commentators and comics.[67] Frank Rich of the "New York Times" wrote: "Thanks to Rekers's clownish public exposure, we now know that his professional judgments are windows into his cracked psyche, not gay people's. But...his excursions into public policy have had real and damaging consequences on a large swath of Americans."[67]
Newsweek's June 7, 2010 issue's Back Story listed Rekers, among others, as a prominent conservative activist who has a record of supporting anti-gay legislation and was later caught in a gay sex scandal.[68]
But, hey!
Sex scandals? Only important when they are Democrats.
IOOKIYAR (It's Only OK If You're A Republican!)
Or unless you're a whistleblower?
Mike Huckabee, one of the Republican morons running for president described the US agreement with Iran regarding Iran’s nuclear energy program as “marching the Israelis to the door of the oven.” In other words, according to Huckabee, Obama has launched the Second Holocaust.
Rand Paul, the libertarian hope, is not far behind Huckabee in his groveling before Israel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bOeYFUphWo
My suggestion is: let’s cut out the middleman. Let’s elect Netanyahu or the Chicago gambling king Sheldon Adelson President of the United States and be done with it.
This explanation of the Iran agreement, if correct, means that the Iranian One Percent sold out Iran in order to join forces with the One Percent in the West. http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/07/24/making-sense-of-the-iran-nuclear-deal-geopolitical-implications/
As for Bill Clinton, so for the British Lords. sex, not mass murder and war crimes, is the punishable offense. http://www.rt.com/uk/310828-lord-sewel-video-resign/
For those dwindling numbers of progressives and liberals who still wear their gullibility on their sleeves by believing in government, digest this: http://www.globalresearch.ca/gmo-labeling-laws-ditched-the-passage-of-the-dark-act-shows-the-arrogance-of-us-politicians/5464711
And what do we make of this? http://www.globalresearch.ca/is-the-medical-pharmaceutical-regulatory-cartel-assassinating-physicians-seven-doctors-have-died-under-suspicious-circumstances/5464663
The other day I heard the BBC presstitute Will Grant patronizing Cuba’s newspaper "Granma." The presstitute, a mouthpiece for Washington and London, was telling the Cuban journalists that now that relations were normalized with the West, "Granma" had to toe the Western propaganda line or remain an outcast in the journalism world. The Cuban journalists made an effort to defend their integrity, but one senses that the allure of foreign travel, conferences and awards will spell the death knell of the newspaper associated with the Cuban Revolution. Of course, the Cuban Revolution itself is finished, as the money pouring in from abroad will reconstruct Cuba and make Cuba into a profitable foreign enterprise of the corporatocracy.
* * *
Obama was recently in Ethiopia where he warned the Ethiopian government against violating the rights of journalists. If only Obama had the same sympathy for American journalists. Instead, Obama threatens American journalists with indictments if they do not rat on their whistleblower sources.
