They Just Won’t Go Away: Obamas Sign Multi-Year Deal With Spotify to Produce Podcasts to ‘Lift Up Diverse Voices’

They Just Won’t Go Away: Obamas Sign Multi-Year Deal With Spotify to Produce Podcasts to ‘Lift Up Diverse Voices’

Cristina Laila by Cristina Laila June 6, 2019

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Just like the Clintons, the Obamas just won’t go away.

First Netflix, now Spotify.

The Obamas signed a multi-year deal with Spotify to continue to push their Marxist propaganda onto the masses.

Barack and Michelle Obama’s production company, ‘Higher Ground’ will produce exclusive podcasts for Spotify to ‘lift up new diverse voices in the entertainment industry,’ the streaming company announced Thursday.

In other words, this is just another way for the Obamas to push radical left-wing propaganda into people’s homes.

“We’ve always believed in the value of entertaining, thought-provoking conversation,” Barack Obama said. “It helps us build connections with each other and open ourselves up to new ideas. We’re excited about Higher Ground Audio because podcasts offer an extraordinary opportunity to foster productive dialogue, make people smile and make people think, and, hopefully, bring us all a little closer together.”

“We’re thrilled to have the opportunity to amplify voices that are too often ignored or silenced altogether, and through Spotify, we can share those stories with the world,” Michelle Obama said. “Our hope is that through compelling, inspirational storytelling, Higher Ground Audio will not only produce engaging podcasts, but help people connect emotionally and open up their minds—and their hearts.”

Since leaving the White House more than two years ago, the Obamas have managed to amass an exorbitant amount of wealth by peddling books and finding new ways to grift.

Barack Obama learned well from the Clintons and recently bagged $600,000 for a single speech in Colombia.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/06/they-just-wont-go-away-obamas-sign-multi-year-deal-with-spotify-to-produce-podcasts-to-lift-up-diverse-voices/

‘In Gold We Trust’: Waning confidence in US sends world’s central banks on buying spree

Governments around the world have recently been on a “gold-buying spree.” These countries have a tactful reason for doing so, and this reason is directly tied to the anticipation of the inevitable end of US hegemony.

Central banks are among the largest purchasers of gold. So far in 2019, they have bought 145.5 tons of gold, which is more in a quarter of a year than central banks have purchased in the preceding six years. To put it bluntly, this figure represents a 68 percent increase from the year before. Last year, central banks increased their reserves by 651.5 tonnes compared to 375 tonnes in 2017. Reportedly, this is the largest net purchase of gold since 1967.

Most interesting, however, is the class of countries that we find are turning to hoarding more and more gold, many of which are deemed to be adversaries of Washington.

As always, Russia is the largest buyer of gold. In 2018, Russia’s Central Bank purchased 274.3 tons of gold. It also dumped 84 percent of its US treasury debts (we will come back to why this is important later.)

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/461207-central-banks-buy-gold-dollar/

Danish PM resigns after left-wing party with strict immigration policy wins general election

Denmark’s prime minister has resigned after his conservative coalition was defeated by the left-wing opposition in a general election. The victorious Social Democrats have promised a tougher migration policy.

Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen announced his resignation on Thursday, leaving the center-left Social Democrats to try to form a minority government. Led by Mette Frederiksen, the Social Democrats won nearly 26% of the vote, giving them 48 seats in parliament. In total, the “red bloc” coalition consisting of the Social Democrats, the Social Liberals, the Socialist People’s Party and the Red-Green Alliance now control a combined 91 of the 179 seats in the legislature, securing a parliamentary majority.

Rasmussen’s coalition was left badly battered after the populist Danish People’s Party’s vote share nosedived to 8.7%, down from 21.1% in 2015. The defeat was a major blow to Rasmussen's Liberal Party, which has been in power for 14 of the last 18 years.

The victory for the Social Democrats can be attributed at least in part to the decision to adopt a stricter stance on immigration – a policy usually associated with right-wing parties. But for Frederiksen and the Social Democrats, being tough on immigration is a way to help safeguard Denmark’s social welfare system – a platform that has resonated with Danes.

“They have a track record that is very pro-social welfare, and that’s what most Danish voters count on,” Bijan Tavassoli, a member of Germany’s Die Linke, told RT. At the same time, “Voters don’t want to see women with burkas on the streets. They don’t want to see children with veils in schools. They want to see an integrated society, and the Social Democrats have promised to deliver that, while at the same time strengthening the social welfare system.”

Voter concerns over uncontrolled migration was a key issue in last month’s European Parliament elections, in which many right-wing and populist parties across the bloc beat out their more immigration-friendly opponents.

https://www.rt.com/news/461211-denmark-social-democrats-immigration-election/

Armed Mexican government stops migrant caravan with armed police and military personnel as tariff deadline looms

Will Mexico's efforts be enough to avert the Trump administration's tariff plan?

Armed Mexican government forces stopped a northbound caravan of Central American migrants after it crossed over the country's southern border from Guatemala.

Reuters reported that the group of migrants met a collection of Mexican military personnel, immigration officials, and police after crossing near the town of Metapa in the southern state of Chiapas.

According to the Associated Press, the migrant column began at a border town and was headed to one of the main cities in the region when it encountered government forces who blocked the highway. Most of the migrants in the group complied with orders from immigration officials and got into vans, but some had to be wrestled to the ground, the report said.

The news comes as the short-term future of the trade relationship between the United States and Mexico hinges on the status of talks between Trump administration and Mexican government officials in Washington, D.C., which began the same day as the caravan interception in Chiapas took place.

After talks concluded Wednesday, President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence publicly said that the discussions had yielded "not nearly enough" progress to avoid implementation of the incremental tariff plan. On Thursday, White House spokesperson Mercedes Schlapp echoed the sentiment.

"It looks like we're moving toward this path of tariffs," Schlapp said on Fox News. "What we've seen so far, the Mexicans, what they are proposing, is simply not enough."

If those tariffs — which would begin at 5 percent and could go all the way up to 25 percent — do end up in place against Mexican goods after the Monday deadline, the administration could expect some serious congressional pushback.

On Thursday, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.) said that he has already planned a move to block the proposed tariffs, should they take effect.

"Commandeering U.S. trade policy to influence border security is an abuse of power," Neal said in a Thursday statement. "If the President does declare a national emergency and attempt to put these tariffs into place, I will introduce a resolution of disapproval to stop his overreach."

The idea of pressuring Mexico's government with punitive trade barriers has also received pushback from Senate Republicans.

"There is no doubt we have an emergency at the border, which is exacerbated and perpetuated by congressional Democrats who refuse to close loopholes in our law that are resulting in a massive influx of illegal immigration," a spokesperson for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told Blaze Media in a statement Wednesday. "The answer, however, is not imposing tariffs against Mexico."

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has also spoken out against the proposal, calling it "a misuse of presidential tariff authority and counter to congressional intent."

https://www.theblaze.com/news/armed-mexican-government-stops-migrant-caravan

Mesa Police Chief Tried to Curb Horrific Brutality Problem, So 95% of Dept. Voted to Remove Him

Mesa, AZ — The Mesa police department held a vote this week in which 95 percent of the entire department voted to remove chief Ramon Batista for no confidence. Batista wasn’t caught molesting kids, or driving drunk, or abusing his power. This police chief was trying to hold violent problem cops within the department accountable, and for this, he is being outed.

“He is no longer welcome in the Mesa Police Department. He is no longer welcome in our home and we’d like him to leave,” said Nate Gafvert, President with the Mesa Police Association.

The trouble for Batista started last year when he attempted to hold the officers accountable who attacked an innocent man waiting for an elevator. Because he crossed the blue line and called out the brutality for what it was, the entire department turned on him.

The union had no problem explaining exactly why they wanted him out—because he tries to keep cops from hurting innocent people. But the cops called this accountability by the chief “intimidation.”

“Morale has never been worse at the Mesa Police Department,” said Will Biascoechea, President of Mesa Fraternal Order of Police, in the statement. “Through his ineffective leadership and intimidation of police officers, Chief Batista has created a toxic environment that puts both police officers and citizens in danger.”

As FOX 10 reports, in a statement released Wednesday, the Mesa Fraternal Order of Police said of the 564 police department employees who responded to the vote, 95% of them said they had no confidence in Chief Batista, with only 23 employees saying they had confidence in the chief.

Despite trying to hold Mesa police officers accountable, Batista has been incredibly ineffective, and now, we likely know why—the entire department thinks accountability amounts to intimidation.

This is in spite of the fact that the Mesa police department is an incredibly violent unit. As TFTP has previously reported, this is the same department that responded to the hotel room of an innocent unarmed father and murdered him on video as he begged for his life on his knees.

In March of 2016, Mesa Police Officer Philip Brailsford was charged with second-degree murder for gunning down Daniel Shaver, an innocent husband, and father of two. The shooting was captured on body cam footage, part of which was released the following May. In December of 2017, a jury, apparently blinded by the badge delivered a verdict of not guilty.

https://thefreethoughtproject.com/mesa-police-chief-vote-removal-brutality/

Huh? Queen introduced to leaders of WWII D-Day ‘allied nations’… including Germany’s Merkel

The British Royals’ official Twitter account has caused bemusement after tweeting a video with a message saying that the Queen met leaders of ‘‘allied nations” that took part in D-Day. And that included Angela Merkel.

The Royal Family Twitter account tweeted about the momentous WWII D-Day event, but may have ostensibly committed a massive faux pas by insinuating that Germany, represented by Chancellor Angela Merkel, was part of the Allied operation to defeat the Nazis.

The Queen was introduced to leaders by the Prime Minister @10DowningStreet - each representing the allied nations that took part in D-Day. #DDay75

The Queen was introduced to leaders by the Prime Minister @10DowningStreet - each representing the allied nations that took part in D-Day. #DDay75pic.twitter.com/8rQ5I0gTBZ

— The Royal Family (@RoyalFamily) June 5, 2019

Many proud Brits picked up on the huge anomaly on Twitter, saying that Merkel doesn’t “represent an allied nation,” and should have been the last leader to be greeted by Her Royal Highness. One person joked that Germany was definitely involved but that maybe it was in a different alliance.

Another tweeted: “Merkel?? Not sure the D-Day event will be much of a celebration for her.”

Others were more accommodating, with one Twitter user revealing that they were “not absolutely convinced” Merkel was representing an Allied nation “but if history can teach us to get on with our neighbours, that’s a good thing.”

World leaders, including US President Donald Trump, UK PM Theresa May, and French President Emmanuel Macron, had gathered in Portsmouth, England with the Queen to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied invasion of Normandy in 1944.

https://www.rt.com/uk/461133-queen-merkel-germany-d-day/

“Open borders are the source of Europe’s strength”, says the UN Secretary-General

EU member-states must cede the power to restrict immigration to technocrats in Brussels because the continent “has been enriched throughout its history by diversity”, according to the Secretary-General of the UN Antonio Guterres.

Upon receiving the pro-globalist, anti-national sovereignty Charlemagne Prize which in past years has been awarded to anti-nationalist figures like Angela Merkel, Pope Francis, and Emmanuel Macron, Mr. Guterres began his acceptance speech by warning the crowd that many Europeans were “turning inward, mired in the memory of a golden age that probably never was”.

Throughout his speech which was full of moral grandstanding, he asserted, “Assimilating several cultures [s]and legacies was the starting point of European culture,” while pointing out that the Charlemagne Palace of Aachen “borrowed several elements of Roman and Byzantine civilization”.

According to Mr. Guterres, European simply cannot “protect [the continent’s]rich heritage” unless they consent to relentless waves of mass immigration from the third world, commit to reducing carbon emissions to zilch by 2050, and meet “the [UN] 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals”, which seeks to implement cultural Marxist doctrine like equality of outcome based on gender, unchecked abortion laws, and the promotion LGBT lifestyles to young children.

The idea of Europe “cannot be premised on ‘us’ versus ‘them” mentality, the Portuguese politician lectured, adding that there exists “no alternative” other than to open Europe’s borders to the third world. He also alleged that “closing our doors to asylum seekers does not protect but shame this heritage”.

“All societies tend to be, or are already, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, and multi-religious. This must be considered as a richness, not as a threat,” Guterres insisted, before demanding Brussels tear down EU nation states’ external frontiers and force taxpayers to send money to the Global South in order to achieve a “balanced [immigration]approach addressing the root causes of migration while preserving the rights and dignity of migrants”.

During his address, the Secretary-General emphasized what he referred to as the three unprecedented challenges” which “knock on our doors” at “this time of great geopolitical disorder”: xenophobic “hate speech” which is “fueling terrorism through social media”, human-created climate change, and mass immigration.

The dangers posed by radical Islamic terrorism were never mentioned during the speech. However, he did warn that “the Human Rights agenda has been losing ground to the national sovereignty agenda”.

https://voiceofeurope.com/2019/06/open-borders-are-the-source-of-europes-strength-says-the-un-secretary-general/

Reports: West Point Cadet Dead, 22 Injured in Major Crash

One cadet is dead and 22 more are injured following a Thursday morning crash near West Point, the U.S. Military Academy in New York’s Orange County, according to reports.

The major crash occurred when an armored personnel carrier overturned during a training accident at West Point. It was reported near Route 293 and Natural Bridge Road in West Point at 7:30 a.m. EST.

NBC New York reports one cadet was seriously injured and is currently unresponsive. The cadet was airlifted to a nearby hospital, while at least four others were taken to a medical center for back injuries, military police told the media.

West Point’s public affairs department confirmed the crash near the summer training site Camp Natural Bridge. “There has been an accident in the vicinity of the Camp Natural Bridge training site. Emergency vehicles are responding. Please avoid Route 293. More information will follow,” the U.S. Military Academy wrote in a tweet.

https://www.breitbart.com/local/2019/06/06/report-at-least-20-cadets-injured-in-crash-near-west-point/

France’s Macron Uses D-Day Speech to Lecture Trump on NATO, European Union

An event commemorating the D-Day landings took a distinctly political turn Thursday after French president Emmanuel Macron used his speech to promote the European Union, the political bloc he aspires to turn into a military power.

Speaking in front of a crowd of D-Day veterans, the President of the United States, and other dignitaries and VIPs, President Macron suggested at the event that being “worthy” of the memory of the events of 1944 meant supporting the European Union.

Amid a speech which largely stuck to honouring veterans and thanking the United States for sacrificing its soldiers to liberate Europe from centralised control from Berlin, the French president talked up his vision of a Europe under centralised control from Brussels, and particularly pushed the importance of military cooperation.

President Macron said:

We shall never cease to perpetuate the alliance of free peoples.

That is what the victorious sides did, when they created the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

That is what a few years later the leaders of Europe did in bringing about the European Union. The lessons of Colleville-sur-mer are clear: liberty and democracy are inseparable.

A key ambition of Macron’s Presidency is to transform Europe, to make it more centralised and integrated. An important part of this is to create a single European military, a project championed and being driven on by both Germany and France.

What President Macron seemingly forgot to mention in his passionate praise of free peoples uniting voluntarily is the difficulty that seems to come with revoking consent of belonging to that group. The European Union of which he spoke so approvingly has actively worked to make the United Kingdom’s withdrawal as difficult as possible, even openly admitting they were doing so to discourage other nations from going their own way.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/06/06/frances-macron-uses-d-day-event-to/

WHO sanitizes Israeli responsibility for Gaza killings

There were nearly 7,000 gunshot wounds among Gaza’s population of two million in the duration of a year.

Many of those injured have extensive and in some cases irreversible damage to their bones, neurovascular structures and soft tissue.

Among them, hundreds face amputations if they cannot access specialized tertiary treatment for their catastrophic wounds.

Three health workers have been killed and more than 700 others injured.

Thousands of elective surgeries were postponed as a health system already in crisis took in wave after wave of emergency casualties.

Cases of gender-based violence seen by service providers doubled as families struggled to cope with additional economic pressures and trauma.

These disturbing facts come from the World Health Organization’s review of trauma data related to the Great March of Return protests in Gaza which began in March 2018.

Sanitized

The data provided by WHO make for harrowing reading. But the report sanitizes the fact that this body-breaking and traumatizing violence is by Israeli policy and design.

Any effective treatment must correctly diagnose the cause and not just the symptoms.

In the year following the launch of the Great March of Return, more than 28,000 Palestinians in Gaza were injured and 277 killed, including 52 children, most of them slain during unarmed, mass protests along Gaza’s eastern and northern perimeter.

Despite the civilian nature of the protests, as was affirmed by a panel of UN investigators, WHO says the deaths and injuries happened “as a result of clashes with Israeli security forces.”

That is a gross mischaracterization of Israel’s use of force against peaceful and unarmed protesters, officially sanctioned by shoot-to-kill or maim orders against civilians who pose no plausible threat, even when they are children.

The killing of some 60 Palestinians during protests on 14 May 2018 was a massacre.

That day, Israeli occupation forces shot almost one person per minute during protests east of Gaza City between 9:30 in the morning and 5:30 in the afternoon, according to the UN commission of inquiry.

Some protesters attempted to breach the boundary fence, or threw stones or spent gas grenades fired by Israel back in the soldiers’ direction. But these were not confrontations between two armed groups as the use of “clashes” by WHO would suggest.

Doctors who treated those wounded that day said, as summarized in the UN commission report, “the injuries resembled those that would typically be seen during a war.”

Hospital doctors told investigators that “one horrific injury after another” arrived to their facilities, the patients presenting massive open wounds to their lower limbs, their “skin and underlying tissue … blown out with the force of the bullet.”

In their report, the UN investigators state that during the months of protests, nearly 1,600 people “were wounded by bullet or bone shrapnel that resulted from ricochets, bullet fragmentation and shots going through one body into another – clearly illustrating the danger of firing high-velocity live ammunition into a crowd of demonstrators.”

The staggering number of casualties is not “a result of clashes with Israeli security forces,” it’s the illegal use of lethal force against unprotected persons by an occupying power that desires the full capitulation of the population under its control.

“Serious human rights violations were committed which may amount to crimes against humanity,” the UN investigators say.

https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/who-sanitizes-israeli-responsibility-gaza-killings

Netanyahu appoints justice minister who supports his immunity from prosecution

A Netanyahu loyalist, Amir Ohana is the country's first ever gay minister

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appointed Likud lawmaker Amir Ohana as justice minister on Wednesday in a move that could shield him from indictment on corruption charges.

Ohana, 43, the country's first ever gay minister, has backed the Nation State law that gives Jews supremacy over all non-Jewish Israeli citizens and has previously blamed Muslims for being “responsible for the acts of murder and massacre in the world over the past 50 years”

Political sources told Haaretz that Ohana was appointed because he supports moves which would exempt Netanyahu from prosecution in three cases involving graft and breach of trust.

Ohana’s appointment comes days after Netanyahu sacked the former justice minister Ayelet Shaked, a right-wing rival who failed to win enough votes in the April elections to return to parliament.

Netanyahu failed to build a coalition after the April polls. Last week, Israeli lawmakers voted to dissolve parliament, paving the way for a new election in September.

'Rule of law gangs'

Born to Jewish immigrants from Morocco, Ohana is a lawyer by training and a former official in Israel’s internal security apparatus Shin Bet.

He is a backer of Netanyahu’s proposed bill that would allow Knesset and government ministers to annul any High Court decision to rescind Netanyahu’s immunity.

The bill would effectively turn the High Court's decisions into non-binding ones.

In an interview with 103 FM Radio last month, as quoted by Haaretz, Ohana said that "immunity laws are needed, especially in a legal world like ours, where there is an offense like breach of trust".

Ohana is known for his hostility towards the Israeli judicial system and its top officials who he once described as the "rule of law gang".

At a public event in Petach Tikvah last month, he decried the High Court as an obstacle to democracy.

"The sovereign is the public. They should make decisions through their elected representatives, because this is democracy … If the High Court intervenes in everything, then why do we need elections?" he was quoted as saying.

In February, he said he expected the government to “draw red lines” for the High Court if its decisions are deemed harmful for the security of citizens.

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israels-netanyahu-appoints-justice-minister-who-supports-immunity-pm

Amassing War Powers, Bolton Rips a Page Out of Cheney’s Playbook

The likely new secretary of defense may be the weakest link in the cabinet—which is exactly what Trump's chief advisor wants.

The elevation of Patrick Shanahan to the secretary of defense position will likely make National Security Adviser John Bolton the most powerful voice inside President Donald Trump’s cabinet.

So say defense analysts who spoke to TAC this week. Former U.S. officials also said they fear that Shanahan’s relative lack of experience may set America on a path to war, and cited a New York Times report that Shanahan had delivered to Bolton a plan to send as many as 120,000 troops to the Middle East. Subsequent reports indicate that the Pentagon might be making plans to send even more.

Shanahan is expected to be nominated for the top Pentagon slot, subject to Senate confirmation. And according to Stephen Wertheim, assistant professor of history at Columbia University, during the confirmation hearings, “when senators think Shanahan, they should think Bolton. Because a vacuum at the top of DoD means that the department becomes a rubber stamp for Bolton.”

Bolton is an unapologetic Bush-era war hawk with four decades of experience inside the Beltway. Throughout his long career, he’s advocated for regime change in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, and Iran. As national security adviser, he appears determined to consolidate his power in the Cabinet, usurping powers that traditionally reside with the military.

For example, the Pentagon is now referring questions about troop deployments to the National Security Council. Taking a page from former vice president Dick Cheney’s playbook, Bolton recently took the highly unusual step of convening a meeting about a possible confrontation with Iran not at the White House, but at CIA headquarters.

Given Bolton’s background and clear aspirations for confronting Iran, the secretary of defense may be the only position within Trump’s cabinet that could serve as a hedge or mediating voice. In cabinet debates over these contentious issues, security analysts fear that the former Boeing executive will be badly outmatched by the decades of experience that Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo bring to the table, especially when compared to his predecessor, decorated Marine General Jim Mattis. Shanahan’s lack of experience in defense strategy and policy is worrying, they say, particularly as Bolton heats up the rhetoric on Venezuela, North Korea, and Iran.

“He’s likely to default to whatever Pompeo or Bolton wants,” retired U.S. Army colonel and defense analyst Douglas Macgregor said in an interview with TAC.

“Pompeo and Bolton have agendas,” Macgregor added. “They’re not Trump’s, but in the absence of strong leadership, Shanahan is unlikely to put up much resistance.”

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/amassing-war-powers-bolton-rips-page-from-cheney-playbook-shanahan-dod/

Israel trying to prevent Senate resolution backing two-state solution

The Israeli government is working to “prevent the Senate from passing a bipartisan resolution endorsing a two-state solution”, according to a report in Axios.

Drafted by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham and Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen, the resolution is expected to be tabled soon. “As a bipartisan measure backed by a close Trump ally like Graham,” Axios noted, it “would be expected to win a substantial majority.”

Citing unnamed Israeli officials and congressional staffers, the report claimed that Ron Dermer, Israel’s ambassador to Washington, and other Israeli embassy officials “have been lobbying Graham and Van Hollen to remove the words ‘two-state solution’ from the text”.

“The Israeli diplomats have told Graham and Van Hollen they don’t oppose a general resolution calling for direct negotiations between the parties with no preconditions, so long as it doesn’t deal with the end game or the parameters of such talks,” Axios added.

Graham and Van Hollen have reportedly so far “rejected the Israeli lobbying efforts”.

Bridgett Frey, a spokesperson for Van Hollen, told Axios: “Both Senators Van Hollen and Graham are long-time supporters of a two-state solution and are working on the best way to advance that commitment in Congress.”

The report added that “the Israeli embassy in Washington did not deny this account but refrained from commenting.”

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190606-israel-trying-to-prevent-senate-resolution-backing-two-state-solution/

Swedish Gov't Intends to Ban Religious Schools, Except Jewish

Swedish Education Minister Anna Ekström has suggested that religious schools are “bad for society” and that stopping them was essential for integration.

The Swedish government intends to stop the future establishment of private charter schools, as a means of indicating that it is a secular state.

As a result of a consensus between the ruling left-of-the-centre red-green coalition and its junior support parties, the Centre and the Liberals, an investigation on the confessional elements in the educational system is now in progress. The assignment of special investigator Lars Arrhenius is to submit proposals for a total stop to the establishment of new primary and secondary schools which have a religious undertone.

“In recent years, we have seen examples of schools that, in the name of religion, separate girls and boys, barely teach about sex or cohabitation, and equate evolution with religious creationism myths. This is totally unacceptable. Now the government is taking the first steps towards stopping new religious schools,” Social Democrat Education Minister Anna Ekström said in a statement.

According to her, the possibility of starting new charter schools with a confessional orientation may ultimately be removed. Existing religious schools shall remain, but may have to revise their regulations.

“In a Swedish school, each student must be free to shape their own perception and future. Not a single child should be forced to participate in confessional elements or denied teaching about, for example, evolutionary doctrine or sex and cohabitation. It is a question of defending the very foundation of the school, that the main emphasis shall be placed on knowledge and education, not religious education,” Anna Ekström explained.

https://sputniknews.com/europe/201906051075642611-sweden-religious-schools-ban/

IBM accused of pumping staff retirement funds into a tanking stock… IBM's to be exact

Big Blue headed to US Supreme Court in battle over investment plans

The US Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case between IBM and employees who have accused the enterprise computing giant of mishandling their retirement fund.

The top court in the nation will decide whether to uphold a lower appeals court decision (PDF) from February that ordered a trial in the class-action legal battle, brought about on behalf of staff enrolled in the IBM Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP). Their lawsuit accuses Big Blue and its retirement plans committee of violating the US Employee Retirement Income Security Act by keeping their money invested in the IT giant's stock despite knowing the share price was overvalued and set to take a hit.

The claim goes back to 2013, when IBM's microelectronics division was in bad shape and Big Blue was looking to sell off the cash-burning business. The plaintiffs argue that the ESOP committee, along with IBM's CFO and chief accountant, decided to hide the dire situation with the microelectronics biz and overvalued the unit at $2bn in the process.

IBM would go on to hand the business (and $1.5bn) to GlobalFoundries in 2014, and share prices took a dive in the aftermath, resulting in the ESOP losing value.

"The plaintiffs here, IBM employees who were participants in the company’s ESOP, claim that the plan’s fiduciaries knew that a division of the company was overvalued but failed to disclose that fact," the appeals court said. "This failure, the plaintiffs allege, artificially inflated IBM’s stock price, harming the ESOP’s members."

The suit is one of two that IBM investors filed over the GlobalFoundries deal. A similar complaint from the International Association of Heat and Frost Insulators and Asbestos Workers Local #6 Pension Fund was dismissed in the district court.

The complaint had also been originally dismissed by the New York Southern US District Court, only to have the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reverse that decision and order the case go to trial. That decision was appealed to the Supreme Court, who has agreed to hear the case and decide whether the plaintiffs have any standing to sue.

Should the court uphold the Second Circuit's decision, the case would be sent all the way back down to the Southern NY court to begin trial proceedings (and would likely result in a settlement). Should the top court side with IBM and the committee, however, the case would be tossed and could set a favorable precedent for other companies that would face similar complaints from employees in the future.

"We are pleased that the Supreme Court will review this matter," Big Blue told The Register in a statement

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/06/03/ibm_supreme_court/

Saudi Arabia buying new missile technology from China: Report

Former US official calls media report 'significant and alarming' as concerns grow over new arms race in Middle East.

Saudi Arabia has significantly escalated its ballistic missile programme by buying technology from China, according to a US media report.

In a story published on Wednesday, broadcaster CNN said the United States government had obtained intelligence on the technology transfers, but the administration of US President Donald Trump did not initially share its knowledge with key members of Congress.

Jeff Stacey, a US national security consultant who worked at the State Department under former President Barack Obama, told Al Jazeera the news report was "significant and alarming".

READ MORE

US senators seek to block Trump arms sales to Saudi Arabia

"The key questions is: is this administration, in any way, not just aware of this, but colluding with this? Are they party to this? How much information have they actually been given by the Saudis? How much have they decided to look the other way?" Stacey said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/06/saudi-buying-ballistic-missile-technology-china-report-190606054204929.html

Spies Are the New Journalists

And with the help of big names in media they’re turning journalism into an intelligence operation

There are two sets of laws in the United States today. One is inscribed in law books and applies to the majority of Americans. The other is a canon of privileges enjoyed by an establishment under the umbrella of an intelligence bureaucracy that has arrogated to itself the rights and protections of what was once a free press.

The media is now openly entwined with the national security establishment in a manner that would have been unimaginable before the advent of the age of the dossier—the literary forgery the FBI used as evidence to spy on the Trump team. In coordinating to perpetrate the Russiagate hoax on the American public, the media and intelligence officials have forged a relationship in which the two partners look out for the other’s professional and political interests. Not least of all, they target shared adversaries and protect mutual friends.

Recently WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was indicted on 17 counts of violating the espionage act for obtaining military and diplomatic secrets from U.S. Army intelligence officer Chelsea Manning and publishing them in 2010. First Amendment lawyers and free speech activists worry that the indictments are likely to have a “chilling” effect on the practice of journalism. Others, however, argue that the First Amendment doesn’t apply to the WikiLeaks founder.

“Julian Assange is no journalist,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers said in a press briefing last week.

The Department of Justice’s position found support, of all places, in the media. “Julian Assange himself is not a journalist,” said CNN national security and legal analyst Asha Rangappa. “He was not engaged in bona fide newsgathering or publication and put national security at risk intentionally,” Rangappa told NPR.

Who’s Asha Rangappa, you ask, and how did she become an expert on journalism?

According to a profile in Elle magazine, she worked three years in the FBI (Robert Mueller was director) as a counterintelligence official in the New York field office before returning to her alma mater, Yale Law School, as its admissions director. In that post she became famous for destroying admissions records to prevent students from legally accessing them. With the advent of the Russiagate hoax, Rangappa has become one of the best-known faces of a new, hybrid industry in which former national security bureaucrats are rebranded as “journalists.”

Here are the people that Americans get their national security news from these days:

Before becoming a national security analyst for CNN, former director of national intelligence, James Clapper, had previously been a news item himself after lying to Congress in 2013 when he testified that the NSA wasn’t collecting data on Americans. He later provided inconsistent testimony to Congress in 2017 when he said he had not spoken with the press about the Steele dossier while he was DNI and then admitted he’d spoken with future CNN colleague Jake Tapper about it.

More

https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/285830/spies-are-the-new-journalists

AG rejects Netanyahu’s bid to further postpone pre-indictment hearing

After hearing was pushed from July to October, PM asked for a second reprieve due to the new elections called for September

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit on Thursday declined a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to delay his pre-indictment hearing in the three corruption cases against him.

Netanyahu had asked the attorney general for a delay a day earlier, citing the recent April 9 elections, and the new election campaign underway for the September 17 vote.

“The dissolution of the Knesset and the holding of new elections can’t in and of themselves constitute a consideration that justifies delaying the hearing date in the investigations concerning the prime minister,” a top adviser to Mandelblit, Gil Limon, said in a letter Thursday to Netanyahu’s lawyers.

Limon noted that Netanyahu was given six months to prepare for the hearing, from when the evidence became available to Netanyahu’s lawyers in April to the scheduled date of the hearing on October 2-3.

Limon also emphasized the state prosecution’s general policy when conducting criminal investigations concerning politicians “of separation, as much as possible, between the legal track of the criminal cases and the political track, with its characteristic instability.”

https://www.timesofisrael.com/ag-rejects-netanyahus-bid-for-further-delay-to-pre-indictment-hearing/

Rabbi Admits that White Genocide is the Goal

House Democrats Suggest They Need a Pay Raise

House Democrats are so pleased with their performance in Congress that they believe taxpayers should be giving them a $4,500 pay raise.

Spending leaders have reportedly voiced support for 2020 funding bills that would no longer block cost-of-living adjustments. Congress had voted to freeze congressional salaries at $174,000 in 2009 as the midterm elections approached and while the Obama economy struggled.

GOP leaders struck down the automatic increases every year since.

Now, with Democrats regaining control of the House following the 2018 midterms, they’re setting their sites on an increase.

Evan Hollander, a spokesperson for the House Appropriations Committee, said: “There is strong bipartisan support for these modest inflation adjustments.”

‘Bipartisan support’ is questionable at best, as opposition remains for anything that would provide poor optics to a political body already viewed negatively by the American people.

“A salary increase for us?” Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-CA) scoffed. “It’s not very high on my radar and it’d be as popular as the plague. It’d show kind of a disconnect with the people.”

An appropriate analogy since most American voters view Congress with more disdain than the bubonic plague.

“I think the American people would think that Congress ought to earn it first,” Senate Appropriations Chairman Richard Shelby (R-AL) suggested.

Have They Earned It?

It would appear House Democrats have moved on from their slogan of “for the people” and shifted more towards concern ‘for their wallets.’

Have they earned that right?

To date, their only legislative accomplishment has been a symbolic vote to pass amnesty legislation for Dreamers, putting the rights of illegals far above those of the people.

Roll Call reported in April that the opposition party has made a habit of holding “votes on resolutions that do not carry the force of law and are designed simply to send a message.”

In other words, they’re pretending to work hard while playing solitaire on their computer when the boss isn’t looking.

Don’t They Make Enough?

Furthermore, how is $174,000 a year not enough of a salary for members of Congress? It’s more than three times the average American’s salary, and yet still isn’t enough for these socialist elitists?

In 2011, two years after congressional pay raises were frozen at that rate, the Department of Defense reported the estimated salary of a Navy SEAL “with over a dozen years of experience and an E-7 pay grade” was about $54,000.

Who deserves the higher salary in that scenario?

Democrats are so enamored with a $15/hour wage for fast food workers while producing far less work than anyone in that industry, they should make that the congressional pay rate going forward.

https://thepoliticalinsider.com/house-democrats-suggest-they-need-a-pay-raise/?utm_campaign=TPI06062019morning&utm_source=criticalimpact&utm_medium=email&utm_content=1d09840caddec138a6473c7b9fa19141&source=CI

D-Day: How the US Supported Hitler’s Rise to Power

On June 6, 1944, Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France, opening a second front against German fascism. The largest contingents of fighters were British, American, and Canadian. This battle has been depicted in movies and books as the decisive turning point of World War II, a ferocious struggle against a superior enemy. But as The Real News Network's Paul Jay and author Peter Kuznick discuss, D-Day was also the moment where the United States' opposition to communism could no longer outweigh its tacit acceptance of Nazism, and the U.S. industrialists who helped rearm Germany after World War I could no longer profit from Hitler's Germany.

“In the aftermath of [World War I], there was such strong anti-war sentiment throughout Europe and throughout the United States that people were very, very loath to get involved in another war, and they were willing to tolerate things they perhaps shouldn't have,” Kuznick said. “The attitude in the United States was that the United States had been effectively suckered into the war by the munitions manufacturers and the bankers. That instead of it being a noble cause to make the world safe for democracy, to fight the war to end all wars, it was really a war to secure the vast Morgan loans to the British and the French and way to fatten the coffers of DuPont and the other munitions makers.”

This opposition to war is why the U.S. and other countries tolerated German rearmament in the '30s, and in the case of many American manufacturers, helped Germany rearm. GM, IBM, and Ford played a major role in rearming Germany. Jay mentioned that in 1938, Hitler even gave notorious anti-Semite and anti-unionist Henry Ford the Grand Cross of the German Eagle, the highest medal a foreigner could receive from the Nazi party. Then, going into World War II, the U.S.'s “big underlying strategy,” Jay explained, was to allow Germany and Russia to fight and “kill each other,” even as the Soviet Union wanted “the British and the Americans and Canadians to join a united front or a broad front of alliance against Hitler as far back as 1939.”

Kuznick explained that then-Senator Harry Truman suggested that the U.S. support whoever was winning the war, whether that was the Russians or the Germans. Moreover, U.S. neutrality in the Spanish Civil War was an example of how extreme post-World War I anti-war sentiments were—as well as a missed opportunity to prevent fascism from spreading.

All of this was happening at the same time that U.S. industrialists were rearming Hitler's Germany, and making money from it.

“There are a lot of American elites who were involved in helping finance and helping rearm and helping rebuild the German economy during this period,” Kuznick said. “A lot of those folks who we call the ‘Greatest Generation' were Nazi enablers, and many of them saw the Nazis as a bulwark against Bolshevism, as against communism, and were therefore happy and willing to support and allow and tolerate and turn a blind eye to the rearmament of Germany during this time because they saw the Nazis as the way to stop the Communists and the Soviet Union.”

https://therealnews.com/stories/d-day-how-the-us-supported-hitlers-rise-to-power

Why your “smart home” is an incredibly STUPID idea

When Google croaked over the weekend, a cascading tidal wave of web services came crashing down, including the Google cloud, Gmail, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and even portions of Amazon. Google owns the “Nest” brand which promises “smart home” functionality to control your home through a Google app on your mobile device. But during the outage, people were locked out of their smart homes… and many were unable to control home appliances such as air conditioners or lights.

It turns out that a “smart home” is an incredibly stupid idea. If you can’t even open your front door without getting permission from a remotely processed Google login procedure that requires the smooth functioning of routers, servers and the power grid, you’ve put yourself in a stupid situation. Do you really want Google — now the most evil corporation in the world — to control your access to your own home? Do you even want Google knowing when you’re entering and leaving your home?

Remember: Facebook just committed an act of terrorism by leaking the identity of a conservative to The Daily Beast, which then used that information to publicly dox the individual, encouraging violent left-wing lunatics to raid his home and try to kill him. There’s no doubt Google has similarly vindictive libtards working for it, and if one of those libtards gained access to your smart home log files, they could both dox you and publicly publish your home access schedules, allowing criminals and Antifa terrorists to target you with remarkable precision. (Similarly, Twitter recently banned hundreds of Tiananmen Square dissident accounts, going all-in with the communist Chinese regime that tortures and organ harvests political dissidents. Those are the values of Twitter and its war criminal CEO Jack Dorsey.)

Physical keys don’t need the internet to work (and that’s what makes them great)

Smart people have physical keys that open physical locks. The reason that’s smart is because physical keys require:

No updates or downloads

No license agreements or terms of service

No electricity or internet functionality

No software, firmware or vaporware

No user rights, user levels or passwords

No encryption, no biometrics and no spying on you

Thus, in a world dominated by evil Google and its surveillance infrastructure that wants to control every last detail of your life, physical keys are pure genius.

This also explains why gold is better than cryptocurrency

https://www.blacklistednews.com/article/73080/why-your-smart-home-is-an-incredibly-stupid.html

Is Haftar helping Daesh return to Libya?

It is now 62 days since the Libyan National Army (LNA), commanded by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, begin its march on the capital Tripoli. During that time Daesh has carried out at least four attacks in LNA controlled areas across the country. Capitalising on chaos and the security void is a well-known strategy by the terror organisation particularly after its defeat in Syria and Iraq. Is Daesh applying the same strategy in Libya where chaos and insecurity are prevalent? Could the terror group emerge as the biggest winner on the fringes of the LNA’s operation to take Tripoli?

So far every indication says Daesh, and other terror groups, stand to gain from the current violence between the LNA and forces loyal to the Government of National Accord in Tripoli. The increased attacks are seen as part of a larger strategy of making the best out of a wicked situation.

In an article published by MEMO on 25 April, it was predicated that the LNA’s offensive on Tripoli will draw more jihadists to Libya and particularly into its the sparsely populated southern desert. This is happening right now. While the LNA is engaged in an increasingly difficult battle to conquer the capital, Daesh is trying to re-establish itself elsewhere in the country. In fact its fighters never left Libya even after they lost Sirte in late 2016. This time though the jihadists are back with different tactics.

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190606-is-haftar-helping-daesh-return-to-libya/

Haftar is a Mossad asset

4 Charged in Green Beret's Death Reportedly Planned to Sexually Assault Him on Camera

Four special operators charged in the 2017 death of one of their comrades planned to tie him up and record him being sexually assaulted, according to a new bombshell report from The Washington Post.

Staff Sgt. Kevin Maxwell, a Raider with Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command, said he was involved in a plan to bust into Army Staff Sgt. Logan Melgar's room with a sledgehammer, put him in a chokehold, and restrain him while a Malian security guard sexually assaulted him, according to documents obtained by the Post.

Melgar, a 34-year-old Green Beret, died June 4, 2017, in Mali. He lived there with two Navy SEALs who were later charged with his death. Maxwell and another Marine Raider, both of whom lived nearby at the time, also face charges in connection to the soldier's death.

Chief Special Warfare Operator Adam Matthews, one of Melgar's roommates, pleaded guilty to his role last month. He was sentenced to a year in military prison.

"I've carried the weight of Staff Sgt. Melgar's death every minute of every day since that night in Mali," Matthews said.

Chief Special Warfare Operator Anthony DeDolph, the other SEAL who lived with Melgar and Maxwell, allegedly put the soldier in a chokehold after the four busted into his room using a sledgehammer at about 5 a.m. They were joined by the Malian security guard and a British man who'd befriended the troops, the Post reported. They had returned from a night of drinking, and the British man planned to record the assault, which would be carried out by the security guard, Maxwell wrote in a stipulation of facts obtained by the newspaper.

Maxwell said the plot was meant to embarrass Melgar, according to the Post. He was scheduled to face a court-martial in Norfolk, Virginia, on Thursday for charges including negligent homicide. His attorney told the Post he'd plead guilty.

"It was a stupid prank. … It went bad," Brian Bouffard, Maxwell's civilian defense attorney, told the paper. "Maxwell is eager to accept responsibility for his role in it."

DeDolph's attorney, however, disputed Maxwell's account.

"We absolutely deny that there was any intent to sexually assault Melgar," Phillip Stackhouse said, according to the Post.

The case is one of several high-profile events involving elite U.S. troops who've been accused of wrongdoing. Maj. Matthew Golsteyn, a former Green Beret, has admitted to killing an unarmed suspected Afghan bomb-maker. Navy Special Warfare Operator Chief Eddie Gallagher is accused of stabbing an unarmed, injured prisoner from the Islamic State group.

Both cases caught the attention of President Donald Trump, who is reportedly considering pardons for the two men.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2019/06/06/4-charged-green-berets-death-reportedly-planned-sexually-assault-him-camera.html

The Long Arm of the Bilderberg Group. Created by the CIA and MI6

hree Italians were invited to this year’s meeting of the Bilderberg Group, which was held in Montreux, Switzerland, (30 May to 2 June). Another journalist was invited with Lili Gruber, the host of the TV channel La7, and now the permanent host of the Bilderberg Group – this was Stefano Feltri, assistant director of Fatto Quotidiano, directed by Marco Travaglio. The “third man” chosen by the Bilderberg is Matteo Renzi, senator for the Partito Democratico, and ex-President of the Council.

The Bilderberg Group, formally established in 1954 on the initiative of certain US and European “eminent citizens”, was in reality created by the CIA and the British secret service MI6, in order to support NATO against the USSR[1]. After the Cold War, it continued to play the same role in support of the strategy of the USA and NATO.

The guests of these annual meetings are almost exclusively citizens of Western Europe and North America. They number approximately 130 representatives from the world of politics, economy, the military, the major media and the secret services, who, formally speaking, participate “in a personal capacity”.

They gather behind closed doors in luxurious hotels, each year in a different country, and are protected by draconian military security systems. No journalists or observers are allowed access, and no communiqué is ever published.

The participants are sworn to silence – they are not even allowed to reveal the identity of the speakers who may have given them information (in total disregard of their proclaimed “transparency”). We only know that this year, they talked mostly about Russia and China, spatial installations, a stable strategic order, and of the future of capitalism.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/long-arm-bilderberg-group/5679805