Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:11 a.m. No.5329180   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9336 >>9350 >>9492 >>9738 >>9811

Humanitarian aid for Venezuela is ‘Trojan horse to provoke war’ – Bolivian President Morales

 

Humanitarian aid shipments to Venezuela are a “Trojan horse” and a pretext for military intervention, said Bolivia’s leftist president, Evo Morales, as the US continues to deliver aid to neighboring countries.

 

“We regret that humanitarian aid will be used as a ‘Trojan horse’ in Venezuela, to invade and provoke a war,” he tweeted. “(Venezuela’s) Latin American brothers can not be complicit in a military intervention. Defending Venezuela is defending the sovereignty of Latin America.”

 

The US has used military aircraft to deliver food, medicine, and hygiene supplies to Colombia, as Washington seeks ways of getting it into Venezuela. Meanwhile, President Nicolas Maduro has dismissed the US aid as “crumbs,” and threatened on Thursday to close the Colombian border. Venezuelan opposition leader and self-declared ‘interim president’ Juan Guaido has promised supporters that he will begin taking in and distributing aid supplies on Saturday.

 

Bolivia is among several Latin American countries that have stuck by Maduro in Venezuela’s ongoing power struggle. Mexico, Cuba, Uruguay, and Nicaragua have all continued to recognize Maduro as the country’s legitimate leader, and Morales has been perhaps the most vocal in condemning Washington’s regime change efforts.

 

After attacking Venezuela economically, Donald Trump is preparing a military intervention against that country,” he tweeted on Wednesday. “We vow to stop the violence, otherwise, Trump will be responsible for the return of the death and destruction that always accompany war.”

 

https://www.rt.com/news/452180-venezuela-aid-morales-trojan-horse/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:12 a.m. No.5329220   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9260 >>9277 >>9294 >>9304 >>9492 >>9738 >>9811

Australian official: Climate change is a U.N.-led conspiracy to establish a new world order

 

Climate change controversy continues to grow, with an increasing number of skeptics coming forward to speak out. Now, a top adviser to former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has just declared that global warming is a conspiracy pushed by a power-hungry United Nations.

 

Maurice Newman, chief business adviser to former PM Abbott, says that the global warming hoax has nothing to do with Earth’s climate, and everything to do with the United Nation’s establishing itself as an authoritarian regime.

 

For years, climate change skeptics have faced insults and ridicule for daring to defy scientific convention. but with a growing body of scientific evidence to dispel climate change mythology, it is clear that skepticism is more than justified.

Denouncing climate change

 

Maurice Newman says that irrespective of what climate data indicates, it has become increasingly obvious that the United Nations is using climate change as a vehicle to expand its power.

 

“This is not about facts or logic. It’s about a new world order under the control of the U.N.,” Newman reportedly stated in a piece for The Australian.

 

“It is opposed to capitalism and freedom and has made environmental catastrophism a household topic to achieve its objective,” he contended further.

 

Newman noted further that the overwhelming majority of studies “proving” the link between CO2 emissions and climate change are now known to be erroneous.

 

Two decades’ worth of climate stability should be enough proof that the climate catastrophe we’ve been hearing about isn’t actually happening. But, as Newman posits, climate change may be less about saving the Earth and more about growing authoritarianism.

 

“The real agenda is concentrated political authority. Global warming is the hook. Eco-catastrophists [ …] have captured the U.N. and are extremely well funded. They have a hugely powerful ally in the White House,” Newman states.

 

Climate change has been an immensely polarizing topic in Australia. Former PM Malcolm Turnbull was recalled over his stance on climate change, while new PM Scott Morrison is making waves by refusing to kowtow to climate fear-mongering. PM Morrison recently revealed that the “land down under” would no longer be contributing to global climate funds.

 

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/australian-official-climate-change-is-a-u-n-led-conspiracy-to-establish-a-new-world-order/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:13 a.m. No.5329240   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9579

Rod Rosenstein: My Time in Law Enforcement ‘Coming to an End’

 

Appearing before University of Pennsylvania students Thursday, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said his time at the Department of Justice is “coming to an end.”

 

“My time as a law enforcement official is coming to an end, a lot later than I expected,” the top law enforcement official said, according to The Hill. “People joke about the revolving door between government and the private sector. The door never revolved for me. It was one way in, and one way out.”

 

Rosenstein’s remarks come as several news outlets reported this week that the Justice Department’s number two is expected to leave his post in mid-March.

 

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump announced he intends to nominate Jeffrey Rosen, a seasoned litigator and deputy transportation secretary, to replace Rosenstein. The announcement came hours after newly-confirmed Attorney General William Barr selected Rosen for the post.

 

Rosenstein’s relationship with the president has been rocky throughout his tenure as deputy attorney general. He has overseen special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 presidential election.

 

Then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the probe due to his involvement in the Trump campaign.

 

President Trump slammed Rosenstein after FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe after he told CBS News’ 60 Minutes that the Justice Department proposed lobbying cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment to oust the president.

 

“He and Rod Rosenstein, who was hired by Jeff Sessions (another beauty), look like they were planning a very illegal act, and got caught,” the president tweeted on Monday.

 

McCabe made the remarks in a sit-down with CBS News’ Pelley to promote his soon-to-be-released-book The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump.

 

“[McCabe] is the very first person involved in these meetings who has come out and spoken publicly,” Pelly told CBS This Morning. “They were counting noses, they were not asking cabinet members whether they would vote for or against removing the president, but they were speculating ‘This person would be with us. That person would not be…’ and they were counting noses in that effort. … This was not perceived to be a joke.”

 

In a statement through the Justice Department last week, Rosenstein rejected allegations made by McCabe, saying “As to the specific portions of this interview provided to the Department of Justice by 60 Minutes in advance, the Deputy Attorney General again rejects Mr. McCabe’s recitation of events as inaccurate and factually incorrect.”

 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/02/22/rod-rosenstein-my-time-as-deputy-ag-coming-to-an-end/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:16 a.m. No.5329313   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9542 >>9738 >>9811

Late-Night Deal Breaks Deadlock Over Natural Gas Exports. The Trump Administration Is Ecstatic

 

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission broke its deadlock over approving liquefied natural gas terminals.

Commissioners hashed out a bipartisan agreement over how to account for greenhouse gas emissions.

The Energy Department sees this as a major “breakthrough” for American energy.

 

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) broke a two-year partisan deadlock Thursday night to approve a liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal in Louisiana.

 

Top Department of Energy (DOE) officials said this was a major breakthrough that will alleviate a growing problem for U.S. energy producers — a lack of export infrastructure.

 

“We have been promoting US energy around the world and today’s decision by the FERC is a very important one,” DOE Deputy Secretary Dan Brouillette told The Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview.

 

The Calcasieu Pass LNG export terminal is the first such project to get FERC approval in two years. Republican FERC commissioners Neil Chatterjee, the chairman, and Bernard McNamee worked with Democrat Cheryl LaFleur to hash out an agreement to get her support.

 

Chatterjee and McNamee needed LaFleur’s vote to approve Calcasieu Pass, which they secured after working out a new approach to account for greenhouse gas emissions from the export facility.

 

“This is a tremendous breakthrough,” DOE Under Secretary of Energy Mark Menezes told TheDCNF. “We hope it will serve as an analytical template going forward.”

 

https://dailycaller.com/2019/02/22/federal-energy-natural-gas-trump/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:18 a.m. No.5329343   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9374 >>9386 >>9405 >>9435 >>9460 >>9492 >>9532 >>9594 >>9678 >>9738 >>9811

Macron: France Could Ban Hate Speech Convicts From All Social Media For Life

 

French President Emmanuel Macron has floated the idea that those convicted for crimes of hate speech could be banned from social media networks permanently.

 

President Macron floated the idea at the annual dinner of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (CRIR) saying that a new bill to fight against hate speech online was being tabled for May of this year broadcaster BFMTV reports.

 

While the bill is being floated at a time where Jews are facing rising levels of real-life anti-Semitic attacks driving whole communities out of French cities, the proposal to stifle speech online comes as President Macron faces unprecedented levels of criticism from the anti-government Yellow Vest movement. The French state has cracked down hard on Yellow Vest activists, arresting 8,400 protestors in just a matter of months.

 

“The European fight must continue, but it is too slow,” Macron said and compared banning those convicted of hate speech form social media to football hooligans being banned from attending football matches.

 

How the government will enforce the ban remains unclear with Secretary of State for Digital Affairs Mounir Mahjoubi saying, “the IP address is what Twitter has on each user who publishes a message on its platform. It must, as soon as possible, send it to the justice system to quickly identify the author and then ‘we can continue’.”

 

“It is no longer acceptable today that platforms that have the means to help justice and the police to identify the person who has committed an offence online take several weeks, even months, before giving the information,” Mahjoubi said.

 

Some have reacted to the proposal with criticism including French journalist Gabriel Robin who said the proposal could lead to anti-establishment voices, such as mass migration critic Eric Zemmour being totally excluded from social media.

 

“Never, I repeat, ever has a liberal government taken so many repressive measures,” he said.

 

While Macron and other globalist politicians have pushed for ever increasing laws and regulations to combat hate speech and so-called fake news online, the new proposal would mark a significant shift to the current punishments of fines and prison sentences.

 

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/02/22/macron-france-could-ban-hate-speech-convicts-from-all-social-media-for-life/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:19 a.m. No.5329381   🗄️.is 🔗kun

‘Jews a Race’ Genetic Theory Comes Under Fierce Attack by DNA Expert

 

Scientists usually don’t call each other “liars” and “frauds.”

 

But that’s how Johns Hopkins University post-doctoral researcher Eran Elhaik describes a group of widely respected geneticists, including Harry Ostrer, professor of pathology and genetics at Yeshiva University’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine and author of the 2012 book “Legacy: A Genetic History of the Jewish People.”

 

For years now, the findings of Ostrer and several other scientists have stood virtually unchallenged on the genetics of Jews and the story they tell of the common Middle East origins shared by many Jewish populations worldwide. Jews — and Ashkenazim in particular — are indeed one people, Ostrer’s research finds.

 

It’s a theory that more or less affirms the understanding that many Jews themselves hold of who they are in the world: a people who, though scattered, share an ethnic-racial bond rooted in their common ancestral descent from the indigenous Jews of ancient Judea or Palestine, as the Romans called it after they conquered the Jewish homeland.

 

But now, Elhaik, an Israeli molecular geneticist, has published research that he says debunks this claim. And that has set off a predictable clash.

 

“He’s just wrong,” said Marcus Feldman of Stanford University, a leading researcher in Jewish genetics, referring to Elhaik.

 

The sometimes strong emotions generated by this scientific dispute stem from a politically loaded question that scientists and others have pondered for decades: Where in the world did Ashkenazi Jews come from?

 

The debate touches upon such sensitive issues as whether the Jewish people is a race or a religion, and whether Jews or Palestinians are descended from the original inhabitants of what is now the State of Israel.

 

https://forward.com/news/israel/175912/jews-a-race-genetic-theory-comes-under-fierce-atta/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:22 a.m. No.5329443   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9492 >>9738 >>9811

The Pentagon wants to know how a border wall will improve troops’ ‘effectiveness’ before it contributes DoD dollars

 

 

The Pentagon has asked Department of Homeland Security to identify locations where border wall construction would improve the “effectiveness" of military troops deployed there, a key justification required to redirect military construction spending that would otherwise go to local base projects.

 

In a memo, dated Feb. 18, DoD asked DHS to identify “priorities for potential construction,” a U.S. official familiar with the memo’s contents told Military Times. Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan is asking for a priority list, as well as the data used to generate that priority list, to help him determine “what projects we support” and what could be delayed, the official said.

 

The Pentagon is looking at how it could spend military construction funds, or MILCON, to comply with President Donald Trump’s declaration of a national emergency last week. Shanahan has not received a response yet from DHS, the official said.

 

Shanahan told reporters Thursday afternoon that Pentagon officials would be going to Capitol Hill Friday to brief Congress “on the way forward and to give people a sense of not just the activities we are going to undertake but [also] the timing."

 

House Democrats have voiced strong opposition to the emergency declaration. In a letter to party members this week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said the president’s decision to move the military funding “goes outside the bounds of the law to try to get what he failed to achieve in the constitutional legislative process.”

 

Some Republicans, too, have raised objections. On Feb. 16., the top Republican on the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, Rep. Mike Turner, acknowledged there are portions of the border where migrants are crossing unimpeded, but said Trump still needs to make a case to Congress that the situation on the border constitutes a national emergency.

 

“It is not a national emergency just because Nancy Pelosi says no,” Turner said. “If the president declares this a national emergency and begins to take funds that have been validly appropriated for other security issues without the debate in Congress, without the approval of Congress, then Congress’s authority has been usurped.”

 

The use of military construction funds is a political hot button. Most of those projects are the result of military communities’ elected officials lobbying — sometimes for years — for new buildings, gyms and housing that are viewed as critical quality-of-life projects. They are also sometimes seen as insulation against base closure. That same funding also supports operational needs, such as the construction of new aircraft hangars.

 

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2019/02/21/dod-asks-dhs-for-data-to-justify-milcon-use-for-border-wall/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:24 a.m. No.5329495   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9505 >>9653 >>9738 >>9811

The Escalation of Israeli Collective Punishment of Palestinians

 

The Israeli authorities forcibly transferred Palestinian Nadia Abu Jamal from Jerusalem in 2017, following the demolition of her family home in 2015. Israel’s National Insurance Institute also revoked healthcare and other social security entitlements from Abu Jamal’s three children, two of whom suffer from chronic medical conditions. The orders came as punitive measures after her husband, Ghassan, was killed while allegedly carrying out an attack. They demonstrate Israel’s expansion of policies that punish Palestinian individuals for offenses they did not commit.

 

Israel has used collective punishment against Palestinians since the military occupation began in 1967 through home demolitions and psychological and economic warfare against the families of alleged attackers – a violation of international law. While implemented across the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), the Israeli authorities have intensified measures on the families and extended families of alleged attackers in East Jerusalem in particular, and especially since 2015.

 

For example, Israeli lawmakers have proposed legislation over the last few years that would legalize actions such as those taken against Abu Jamal by officially enabling the state to revoke the permanent residency status of family members of alleged attackers. In December 2018 the Israeli Knesset passed the preliminary reading of a bill that would allow the forcible transfer of families of alleged Palestinian attackers from their hometowns to other areas of the West Bank. Netanyahu expressed support for the bill, declaring: “Expulsion of terrorists is an effective tool. To me the benefit exceeds the damage. Jurists say it’s against the law given how it’s defined, and it will surely be a legal challenge, but I have no doubt of its effectiveness.”

 

This commentary tracks the rise in Israeli collective punishment against alleged attackers’ families through such acts as forcible transfer, home demolitions, and economic warfare, and suggests possibilities for countering Israel’s efforts to inscribe these methods into law to use them to intensify the displacement of Palestinians from Jerusalem.

 

http://imemc.org/article/the-escalation-of-israeli-collective-punishment-of-palestinians/

 

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Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:27 a.m. No.5329552   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9603 >>9664 >>9738 >>9811

Group of American vets detained in Haiti on weapons charges brought back to US, arrested upon landing

 

A group comprised of former U.S. military veterans and security contractors who were detained in Haiti on weapons charges has been brought back to the United States and arrested upon landing, The Miami-Herald reported.

 

The men — five Americans, two Serbs, and one Haitian — were stopped at a Port-au-Prince police checkpoint on Sunday while riding in two vehicles without license plates, according to police. When questioned, the heavily-armed men allegedly told police they were on a "government mission" before being taken into custody.

 

Just days after their arrest, however, seven of the eight men were released from custody in Haiti before they were scheduled to show up to their first court appearance. They were whisked away to the United States on an American Airlines flight to Miami on Wednesday, where they were arrested upon landing, according to The Herald.

 

"The return of the individuals to the U.S. was coordinated with the Haitian authorities," a State Department spokesperson told Task & Purpose. The spokesperson declined to answer when asked if they were operating on a U.S. government contract in Haiti.

 

Video taken by a Twitter user named HaitiInfoProject showed the men being escorted by U.S. embassy personnel through the airport in Haiti; another video showed them as they exited the flight with law enforcement back in Miami.

 

https://taskandpurpose.com/americans-detained-haiti

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:33 a.m. No.5329685   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9718 >>9738 >>9757

Where are the ‘empty shelves’? Max Blumenthal tours Caracas supermarket

 

Corporate media grieve for the barren shelves and empty bellies in Venezuela, but are the alleged food shortages real? After touring a supermarket in Caracas, Max Blumenthal found plenty to buy – even craft beer.

 

“Grocery shelves lie empty as food becomes increasingly scarce” in Venezuela, the UK Independent weeps. The country’s shops remain open but “sparsely stocked,” The Guardian laments. Even “basic commodities” such as toothbrushes aren’t available for purchase, CNN bemoans. “Hungry” Venezuelans must choose between “torture or starvation,” Bloomberg grimly concludes. Mainstream media coverage of Venezuela gives the impression that President Nicolas Maduro is slowly starving his own people – a narrative which, as journalist Max Blumenthal found after surveying a massive supermarket in Caracas, is wildly deceptive.

 

The store offered a wide selection of meat, produce, and dairy (although no low-fat Greek yogurt, an indignity which is likely the result of Maduro’s tyrannical ways, Blumenthal jokingly hypothesizes). Most importantly, craft beer – a hallmark of heroic consumerism – could be found in the supermarket’s alcohol aisle.

 

Blumenthal also marveled at the store’s huge variety of scented toilet paper, shampoo and toiletries – the “basic commodities” which, according to CNN, are nowhere to be found in Venezuela.

 

There isn’t an issue here with food distribution or food scarcity,” Blumenthal concludes. “The issue is the buying power of Venezuelans has been completely destroyed because their currency has been so badly weakened by hyperinflation, speculation and the flood of dollars that the government can’t control here, as well as hoarding by private capitalist elements that support the opposition.”

 

The amusing bit of on-the-ground reporting comes amid a tense stand-off over US attempts to deliver what Washington describes as humanitarian aid into Venezuela, in defiance of the wishes of its government. Juan Guaido, the US-backed, self-declared “interim president” of Venezuela, said on Thursday that he will personally go to the border with Colombia to get the shipment from the US, urging drivers to go with him and defy the border guards ordered to prevent the delivery.

 

Humanitarian organizations have distanced themselves from the alleged aid package, amid accusations that the “humanitarian aid” could contain military equipment, or be used for political purposes.

 

https://www.rt.com/news/452158-blumenthal-venezuela-supermarket-shelves/

Anonymous ID: 0f7a5c Feb. 22, 2019, 11:34 a.m. No.5329705   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>9738 >>9811

Assange Reportedly Gets New Passport Despite Possible Arrest in UK

 

The WikiLeaks founder's previous passport expired several years ago, as he has been taking refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in order to avoid arrest and extradition to the US. Assange applied for a new passport in 2018, but the approval process was stalled by legal proceedings against him in the UK for violating his bail conditions.

 

Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has received a new passport to replace an expired one after a lengthy approval process, the Sydney Morning Herald reported, citing the Consular and Crisis Management Division's first assistant secretary, Andrew Todd. The media outlet added that Assange had received a passport in September 2018, but remained unreported until recently.

 

Assange's lawyer, Jennifer Robinson, applied for a passport on the WikiLeaks founder's behalf in mid-2018, but the application was put "on hold" by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), citing ongoing legal proceedings against Assange in the UK due to his breach of bail conditions. According to the Australian Passport Act, "serious foreign offence" could prevent the activist from obtaining a new passport.

 

Julian Assange is currently facing the prospect of being forced to leave the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he has spent over six years hiding after being released on bail by a UK court due to facing rape accusations in Sweden. The latter country lifted the charges in 2017, but Assange could still be arrested by British authorities for violating the bail conditions by taking refuge in the embassy.

 

The WikiLeaks founder fears that he would be arrested by UK police upon leaving his hideout and subsequently extradited to the US for his part in publishing numerous secret documents of the American government on his website.

 

https://sputniknews.com/asia/201902221072654073-assange-new-australian-passport/