OPCW-DOUMA - Release Part 4

27 December, 2019

Today WikiLeaks releases more internal documents from the OPCW regarding the investigation into the alleged chemical attack in Douma in April 2018.

One of the documents is an e-mail exchange dated 27 and 28 February between members of the fact finding mission (FFM) deployed to Douma and the senior officials of the OPCW. It includes an e-mail from Sebastien Braha, Chief of Cabinet at the OPCW, where he instructs that an engineering report from Ian Henderson should be removed from the secure registry of the organisation:

“Please get this document out of DRA [Documents Registry Archive]… And please remove all traces, if any, of its delivery/storage/whatever in DRA”.

The main finding of Henderson, who inspected the sites in Douma and two cylinders that were found on the site of the alleged attack, was that they were more likely manually placed there than dropped from a plane or helicopter from considerable heights. His findings were omitted from the official final OPCW report on the Douma incident.

Another document released today is minutes from a meeting on 6 June 2018 where four staff members of the OPCW had discussions with “three Toxicologists/Clinical pharmacologists, one bioanalytical and toxicological chemist” (all specialists in chemical weapons, according to the minutes).

The purpose of this meeting was two-fold. The first objective was

“To solicit expert advice on the value of exhuming suspected victims of the alleged chemical attack in Douma on 7 April 2018”. According to the minutes, the OPCW team was advised by the experts that there would be little use in conducting exhumations. The second point was “To elicit expert opinions from the forensic toxicologists regarding the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims.”

More specifically,

“…whether the symptoms observed in victims were consistent with exposure to chlorine or other reactive chlorine gas.”

According to the minutes leaked today: “With respect to the consistency of the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims with possible exposure to chlorine gas or similar, the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure”.

The OPCW team members wrote that the key “take-away message” from the meeting was

“that the symptoms observed were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified”.

The third document is a copy of OPCW e-mail exchanges from 20 to 28 August 2018 discussing the meeting with the toxicologists.

The fourth document is an e-mail exchange from the end of July 2018 where it is stated that the eight OPCW inspectors deployed to Douma during the fact finding mission (except one, a paramedic) should be excluded from discussions on the project.

https://wikileaks.org/opcw-douma/#OPCW-DOUMA%20-%20Release%20Part%204

correctly_redacted_emails_re_toxicology_minutes

https://wikileaks.org/opcw-douma/document/correctly_redacted_emails_re_toxicology_minutes/

actual_toxicology_meeting_redacted

https://wikileaks.org/opcw-douma/document/actual_toxicology_meeting_redacted/

exclusion_of_douma_ffm_team_july_2018

https://wikileaks.org/opcw-douma/document/exclusion_of_douma_ffm_team_july_2018/

removal_of_engineering_report_februar_2018

https://wikileaks.org/opcw-douma/document/removal_of_engineering_report_februar_2018/

IG Report Reveals Someone’s Not Telling the Truth – AG Lynch, Comey, McCabe and Rosenstein All Caught in Conflicting Accounts

The Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General’s (IG’s) Report on FISA Abuse points out a number of conflicting statements. One of the biggest whoppers is between Obama’s Attorney General (AG) Loretta Lynch and former and now fired FBI Directors James Comey and Andrew McCabe. Not to be outdone, former Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Rod Rosenstein makes suspect claims himself.

In the IG’s report there are conflicting accounts of when the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation started and various accounts of who knew what and when.

Obama’s AG Lynch claims that she doesn’t recall having a briefing on this investigation (p. 74):

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/12/exclusive-ig-report-reveals-someones-not-telling-the-truth-ag-lynch-comey-mccabe-and-rosenstein-all-caught-in-conflicting-accounts/

Pelosi Still Won’t Release Transcripts From Secret Schiff Basement Meetings that Exonerate President Trump and Indict Whistleblower of Perjury!

Speaker Nancy Pelosi won’t turn over the articles of impeachment to the US Senate.

But that’s not all…

Speaker Pelosi and Adam Schiff still won’t release transcripts from their secret basement hearings that exonerate President Trump and indict the alleged whistleblower of perjury!

The hidden transcripts also bury evidence that shows the so-called whistleblower Eric Ciaramella committed perjury.

Rep. Ratcliffe said House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff is burying evidence of the whistleblower’s crimes in the House SCIF.

A couple weeks ago, Ratcliffe revealed he “asked IG Atkinson about his “investigation” into the contacts between Schiff’s staff and the person who later became the whistleblower. The transcript is classified “secret” so Schiff can prevent you from seeing the answers to my questions.”

Ratcliffe suggested Monday that the “whistleblower” Eric Ciaramella committed perjury by making false statements in his written forms filed with the ICIG and that Adam Schiff is hiding evidence of Ciaramella’s crimes to protect him from a criminal investigation.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/12/stunning-pelosi-still-wont-release-transcripts-from-secret-schiff-basement-meetings-that-exonerate-president-trump-and-indict-whistleblower-of-perjury/

Maddow Meltdown: In Defense To OAN Lawsuit, Host Argues Her Words Are Not Facts

Back in September, we reported that TV network OAN had filed a lawsuit against Rachel Maddow for the time the host said that OAN “really, literally is paid Russian propaganda.”

Now, Maddow finds herself having to come up with a defense for her statement in court. And she has also apparently hired Lionel Hutz as her legal adviser.

According to Culttture, her lawyers argued in a recent motion that "…the liberal host was clearly offering up her ‘own unique expression’ of her views to capture what she saw as the ‘ridiculous’ nature of the undisputed facts. Her comment, therefore, is a quintessential statement ‘of rhetorical hyperbole, incapable of being proved true or false."

Oh, it's capable of being proved false, alright. Maddow had previously claimed, on air, about one of OAN's reporters:

“In this case, the most obsequiously pro-Trump right wing news outlet in America is really literally is paid Russian propaganda,” and added, “Their on-air politics reporter (Kristian Rouz) is paid by the Russian government to produce propaganda for that government.”

The testimony of UC Santa Barbara linguistics professor Stefan Thomas Gries, however, stands at odds with Maddow's defense. Gries said: “It is very unlikely that an average or reasonable/ordinary viewer would consider the sentence in question to be a statement of opinion.”

Gries continued: “I am the second most widely-cited cognitive linguist and sixth most widely-cited living corpus linguist. The field of cognitive linguistics draws from both linguistics and psychology and studies how language interacts with cognition.”

OAN had filed the defamation suit in federal court in San Diego, according to AP. OAN is a small, family owned conservative network that is based in San Diego and has received favorable Tweets from the President. It is seen as a competitor to Fox News.

https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/maddow-meltdown-defense-oan-lawsuit-host-argues-her-words-are-not-facts

Domino's Pizza Group CFO Dies In Tragic Holiday Accident

UK-based Domino's Pizza Group announced on Friday that CFO David Bauernfeind died after a tragic accident while on vacation with his family, Bloomberg News reports.

The tragedy, which happened on Thursday, comes at a difficult time for Domino's: The company is still looking for a new Chairman and a new CEO, and without its CFO, the C-Suite is looking dangerously empty heading into the new year.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/dominos-pizza-group-cfo-dies-tragic-holiday-accident

Islamic State Releases Christmas Video Claiming To Show Beheading Of Christians

The Islamic State (IS) on Thursday released a video that allegedly shows the killing of 11 Christians, 10 of whom were beheaded.

As part of a campaign to avenge the death of former IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the Islamic State released a video that they say shows the killing of 11 unidentified Christian men who IS “captured in the past weeks” in the north-eastern Borno State in Nigeria, according to the BBC.

IS released the video on December 26, a move analysts told the BBC is intended to coincide with Christmas Day.

“We killed them as revenge for the killing of our leaders, including Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and [IS spokesman] Abul-Hasan al-Muhajir,” a member of the Islamic State’s media unit said, a journalist who was originally sent the video told BBC. The publication notes that the Nigerian government has not yet commented on the video.

The video, which appears to be filmed in an unidentified outdoor area, shows ten of the men pushed to the ground and beheaded while a man in the middle is shot dead.

The beheadings are probably the work of ISWAP or the “Islamic State West Africa Province,” the BBC notes, a faction of the Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram that broke away in 2016. ISWAP is also active in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Mali. ISWAP is believed to be currently holding dozens of captives in Nigeria.

https://dailycaller.com/2019/12/27/islamic-state-beheadings-christians-christmas/

EU to Threaten Blocking City of London Trade Unless UK Abides by Brussels’ Rules: Report

Brussels is reportedly planning on threatening to block the City of London, the nation’s finance capital, from European markets unless the UK agrees to remain aligned to EU regulations post-Brexit.

EU negotiators are set to insist the UK retain close alignment with Brussels’ regulations for financial services and data flows when they sit down for internal talks in two weeks’ time, according to restricted documents reported by The Times.

The EU is keenly aware of London being a financial hub and the importance of retaining unrestricted access to EU markets, and will use this as a stick to beat the UK should the country wish to diverge after the end of the transition period in December 2020. If EU standards are not maintained, Brussels could limit or pull completely the UK’s access to the bloc’s financial markets.

“These are both big levers for the EU,” a senior European diplomatic source told the newspaper of record. “Data adequacy and equivalence [for financial services] are decisions under our direct control, decisions that can be reversed at any time and that will be linked to progress in the wider negotiations.”

The tactic will be employed to force the UK to remain in “level playing field” territory. European countries have remained insistent that the EU must retain its regional monopoly with France’s Europe minister Amélie de Montchalin saying in October that she did not want to have “a tax haven at the gates of Europe”. German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed the same anxiety later that month that Brexit Britain could become a “potential competitor” to the bloc on the same level as the United States or China.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/12/27/eu-threaten-blocking-city-london-trade-unless-uk-abides-brussels-rules/

Mexican National Guardsman Caught Dumping Torched Body in Sinaloa

A member of Mexico’s newly formed National Guard (GN) is under investigation after authorities reportedly caught him disposing of a burned body in Sinaloa. The victim’s throat was also slit.

The arrest took place on Thursday morning in Mazatlán, Sinaloa, when local police spotted three men walking out of a brushy area. Officers stopped the men to question their activities at such an early hour and suddenly sensed the smell of burning flesh which led to the charred remains of a male victim, a statement from Sinaloa Attorney General’s Office revealed.

https://www.breitbart.com/border/2019/12/27/mexican-national-guardsman-caught-dumping-torched-body-in-sinaloa/

Fearing US Policy Shift, Saudis Start Talking to Enemies

Saudis make a big move from confrontation to negotiation

Saudi Arabian foreign policy in recent years has been informed by having absolute, unquestioned US support. This has driven mounting hostility toward Iran, and was why the Saudis figured they could declare Qatar “the enemy” with impunity.

Saudi officials are starting to second-guess themselves, however, between the US not scrapping ties with Qatar, and not unilaterally attacking Iran any of the many times the Saudis argued there was a pretext to do so. This has forced them to revise a very confrontational foreign policy to one with negotiation.

That’s a huge shift, and the most apparent signs of a Saudi shift are recent negotiations with Qatar, and a recent willingness to directly talk peace with Yemen’s Houthis are years of war.

While some analysts are presenting this as the “fault” of President Trump not attacking Iran back in September, when he blamed them for a drone strike on the Saudis, it isn’t at all clear why this is a bad thing in the first place.

It isn’t clear anyone benefited from Saudi Arabia believing they could declare Qatar such an enemy that they could blockade them and threaten to dig a channel along the border to turn Qatar into an island, or that diplomacy as such was beneath them. Diplomatic engagement might even end the Yemen War, which is something much of the world has been calling for for a long time.

It’s unlikely that President Trump did this by design, as his statements have repeatedly been that support of the Saudis is unchanged, and he keeps throwing more US troops at Saudi Arabia to “protect them.”

https://news.antiwar.com/2019/12/26/fearing-us-policy-shift-saudis-start-talking-to-enemies/

Philippines president bans 2 US senators from entering country over support of top government critic

The Philippines has banned two U.S. senators from visiting and has threatened to introduce stricter entry restrictions for all American citizens over proposed U.S. sanctions on the Philippines following the detention of a critic of the country’s government, Reuters reported.

President Rodrigo Duterte said he will impose a requirement on U.S. citizens to obtain visas in the country if any Philippine official involved in the jailing of Senator Leila de Lima is denied entry to the United States. Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) have sought the move.

He ordered the country’s Bureau of Immigration to refuse entry to the Democratic lawmakers, CNN Philippines reported.

"The Philippines is immediately ordering the Bureau of Immigration to deny US Senators Dick Durbin and Patrick Leahy — the imperious, uninformed, and gullible American legislators who introduced the subject provisions into the 2020 budget — entry to the Philippines," presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo told reporters Friday, according to CNN. Duterte asked Panelo to implement the ban immediately.

Congress has approved a 2020 budget that contains a provision blocking those who were involved in de Lima’s incarceration from entering the U.S. She was charged with drug offenses in 2017 after leading an investigation into mass killings amid Duterte’s anti-drugs attacks.

“We will not sit idly if they continue to interfere with our processes as a sovereign state,” Panelo also said, Reuters reported.

“The case of Senator de Lima is not one of persecution but of prosecution,” he continued.

American citizens can currently enter the Philippines without a visa for up to 30 days, and the two countries have been longtime allies.

De Lima, who has won multiple human rights awards and formerly served as a justice minister in the country, expressed her gratitude to the U.S. Congress, Reuters reported.

https://thehill.com/policy/international/asia-pacific/476006-philippines-president-bans-2-senators-from-entering-country

First regiment of Avangard hypersonic missile systems goes on combat duty in Russia

The new weapon was unveiled by Putin on March 1 last year

The first regiment of Avangard hypersonic missile systems has gone on combat duty in Russia, the Defense Ministry reported on Friday.

"Russian Defense Minister Army General Sergei Shoigu reported to Russia’s President Vladimir Putin that the first missile regiment armed with the latest Avangard strategic missile system with the hypersonic boost-glide vehicle assumed combat duty from 10:00 a.m. Moscow time on December 27, 2019," the ministry said in a statement.

It was earlier reported that the first regiment of Avangard hypersonic missile systems would go on combat duty in the Dombarovsky division of the Strategic Missile Force in the Orenburg Region in the Urals.

The Avangard is a strategic intercontinental ballistic missile system equipped with a hypersonic boost-glide vehicle. According to open sources, the breakthrough weapon was developed by the Research and Production Association of Machine-Building (the town of Reutov in the Moscow Region) and was tested from 2004. The boost-glide vehicle is capable of flying at over 20 times the speed of sound in the dense layers of the atmosphere, maneuvering by its flight path and its altitude and breaching any anti-missile defense.

The new weapon was unveiled by Russian President Vladimir Putin in his State of the Nation Address to the Federal Assembly on March 1 last year. The Russian leader said at a board meeting of the Defense Ministry in late 2018 that Russia had launched the serial production of Avangard hypersonic missile systems. Putin said at the time that the Avangard, along with Sarmat missiles, Kinzhal and Peresvet missile systems, would multiply boost the potential of the Army and the Navy to reliably ensure Russia’s security for decades to come.

https://tass.com/defense/1104297

Authorities have Always Prevented the Bright Future of Humankind

Authorities have power over people, and they enjoy this power. They preserve their power in society primarily by imposing knowledge on people. Authorities have been teaching us everything we know. Nothing can come to us if it does not pass the filters of authorities. We are what the authorities made us become, and it is challenging to escape from it.

If you love baseball, democracy, or god, this is because the authorities made you love it. People hardly get a chance to love something if the authorities did not let them, even though people believe that they have free will. The point is, people may only choose the options that authorities give them. Inconvenient options for authorities are not even accessible to people. For example, society has never developed a knowledge of how to create a just society because the authorities have prevented searching for the solution. When people build something new on the top of the choices the authorities give them, this is only the development of the will of authorities.

Authorities create rules which implement social policy, and people have to obey them. These rules have become the origin of social sciences. Authorities have always supported social ideas that followed their interests and suppressed those that didn’t. Therefore, social scientists have followed the interest of authorities and not of people. As a result, social sciences alienate society from social justice. We may accept that social scientists acted the best they could under the pressure of authorities, but also, their work prevents the progress of society.

Even when social scientists want to improve society, they can hardly do it because the alienated knowledge they accepted from their predecessors put them on the wrong path. Through the history of humankind, authorities have supported the creation of complex social sciences that prevent us from finding the escape from social problems. We think the way the authorities taught us to think, and that prevents us from searching for the bright future of humankind.

Social scientists have developed democracy and presented it as the best political choice of the people, by the people, for the people. According to this introduction, democracy must have been in the interest of authorities; otherwise, it would not be allowed to exist. Authorities have learned that dictatorship initiates a rebellion of people, which may take their lives. They found it more convenient to control the social policy secretly by manipulating people. Today they do it by controlling politicians, scientists, and media with the economic power they possess. I have presented how efficient they are in the article The Conspiracy of the World Exposed. As a result, we have a democracy that follows the interests of the elite and not of people. It is nothing else but a form of dictatorship that keeps preventing the freedom of people. Democracy must have been a designed forgery of the authorities.

We name the authorities in capitalism, the elite. We call them the elite because they do not rule over society openly as authorities historically did, but by secretly using the wealth they possess. Their power is nothing lesser than the power of dictators who openly ruled, but it is much more secure and stable. People cannot replace the elite from power because they do not know who they are. The politicians who work for the elite listen to their messages very carefully because otherwise, they would lose financial support from the elite and would not be able to be politicians.

https://thesaker.is/authorities-have-always-prevented-the-bright-future-of-humankind/

The CIA on Romania’s situation ’82-90

Partially declassified documents from the Central Intelligence Agency on the events of December 1989 in Romania and subsequent developments in January 1990 reveal that the group who killed Ceausescu and took over the state, the FSN [The National Salvation Front], could no longer hide its lack of credibility and internal dissensions. In the CIA document, dated 27th of January 1990, “President Iliescu admitted on Thursday that the political situation is unstable, warning that anarchy could follow if the provisory government were to fall.”

Another CIA report, dated January 30th 1990, [via Mediafax] announced the return of the Securitate. “The anti-regime demonstrations push the FSN, currently in power, to make recourse to Ceausescu’s merciless political police. Note: The present low profile of the Securitate will change if, and it’s probable, the FSN continues to be the target of attacks, for its half-measures on democratic reforms. The utilization of Securitate personnel in limiting the protests amplify the likelihood that anti-government demonstrations will turn violent. As in the case of Ceausescu’s ouster, the Romanian army may play a key role in the FSN’s survival.”

An older, partially declassified CIA document, from March 4th 1982, titled “Unrest in Romania: Causes and implications,” analyzed how Ceausescu’s administration was undermined by “dogmatic” internal policies, “economic stagnation and growing unrest,” and named key players who might have replaced Ceausescu in the event of a “forced succession.” This short list formed Nicolae Ceausescu’s so-called “inner guard” and it included Emil Bobu, then Deputy Premier, Elena Ceausescu, the head of state’s wife and the Permanent Bureau First Deputy Prime Minister, Iosif Blanc, Permanent Bureau Secretary of the Cadres, and Ion Coman, Secretary for Military and Security Affairs.

A second group of so-called “power brokers” consisted of politically powerful individuals who wouldn’t have been removed from power, in case of a coup, even though they were loyal to Ceausescu. Ilie Verdet, the Permanent Bureau Prime Minister, Constantin Dascalescu, Permanent Bureau Secretary for Party Organization, Stefan Andrei, the Permanent Bureau Minister of Foreign Affairs, Cornel Burtica, the Permanent Bureau Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Trade. It’s safe to classify this group as part of “the deep state” within Romania at the time – the group that keeps the state vehicle operation, regardless of what happens politically.

https://theduran.com/the-cia-on-romanias-situation-82-90/

Trump to California Governor Gavin Newsom: ‘Fix your homeless problem or I will’

rump and Gavin Newsom have had some interesting dealings in the past.

Newsom actually went from harsh critic…

California Governor Signs Bill That Keeps Trump Off 2020 Ballot Unless He Releases Tax Returns

…to humble beggar in a matter of about 2 months.

Too Funny! California Governor Begs President Trump For Money To Save Him From His Homeless Problem

That tax return provision has now been overruled, by the way.

Trump will be on the ballot.

Trump is not the most forgiving President we have ever had when it comes to his critics.

Trump is NOT accepting Gavin Newsom’s begging pleas, likely because he doesn’t think Newsom knows how to fix the problem.

Now he has simply doubled down and told Newsom to fix the problem, or he will.

From The National Sentinel:

(TNS) Must Americans living in major California cities be forced to live a lower quality of life than other Americans? Democrats who rule the state think so, but President Donald Trump does not.

As readers know, several major cities in the Golden State have become magnets for the homeless, turning block after block into fetid, rat-infested, filthy harbors of Medieval diseases, thanks to Garbage Party policies.

And as more California voters — including those who vote traditionally for Democrats — become fed up with stepping in human waste on their streets, not to mention having to deal with rising crime, their rulers are turning a deaf ear to the complaints.

As such, the president on Wednesday warned Gov. Gavin Newsom and his party to get their act together and clean up their cities or he will.

“Governor Gavin N has done a really bad job on taking care of the homeless population in California,” he tweeted. “If he can’t fix the problem, the Federal Govt. will get involved!”

https://www.dcclothesline.com/2019/12/27/trump-to-california-governor-gavin-newsom-fix-your-homeless-problem-or-i-will/

ISIS Cells Shell U.S. Base In Key Eastern Syria Oil Field

ISIS announced on December 27 that its cells had shelled a U.S. base within al-Omar oil fields in the southeastern countryside of Syria’s Deir Ezzor.

A source in the terrorist group told the Amaq news agency that eight Katyusha rockets were launched at the base. The group usually uses the name of the Soviet rocket to refer to variants of 107 mm rockets.

Amaq released a video showing the rocket attack on the base, which contains a helicopters’ landing strip, a housing for U.S. personnel and several military and security headquarters. ISIS also claimed that the base hosts a secret prison run by the U.S. and Kurdish forces.

ollowing the rocket attack, U.S. attack helicopters carried out a patrol in the outskirt of al-Omar oil fields. A unit of the U.S. military also raided the nearby town of Shheell. However, the attackers were not caught, according to Amaq.

This was the second such attack in the last 48 hours. A day earlier, ISIS cells in the northeastern region shelled a large base of the U.S.-led coalition in the southern al-Hasakah countryside. No casualties were reported as a result of both attacks.

ISIS said that the two attacks were carried out in the framework of the ongoing military campaign to avenge the death of the terrorist group’s leader, Abu Baker al-Baghdadi, and the group’s spokesman, Abu Hassan al-Muhajir.

Last month, the Pentagon announced that its keeping 500 U.S. troops in eastern Syria to “guard” oil fields in northern al-Hasakah and southeast Deir Ezzor. Prior to this move there were almost no attacks by ISIS on the region’s oil fields.

https://southfront.org/in-video-isis-cells-shell-u-s-base-in-key-eastern-syria-oil-field/

Elizabeth Warren's Brother Says She's Lying About Their Father's Occupation on Campaign Trail

Elizabeth Warren has spent much of her life crafting a false narrative about her origins and life story. She claimed Native American heritage, using this claim of minority status to advance herself in education and in her career. After years of being called out on, she took a DNA test which revealed she is as little 1/1024th Native American.

In order to help her present herself as a crusader for the poor in spite of her tremendous wealth, she's played up her modest upbringing in Oklahoma, even claiming that she couldn't afford to go to college, even though she obviously could.

But that's not all. Elizabeth Warren has been telling another whopper on the campaign trail to play up the "I grew up poor, I'm just like you and will fight for you!" narrative. David Herring, Elizabeth Warren's brother, is "furious" that his sister is claiming on the campaign trail that their father was a janitor.

The Boston Globe reports that a family friend says "David has disagreed with the way Warren calls herself the daughter of a janitor as she describes the work he found after losing a job as a salesman after his heart attack."

"My Dad was never a janitor," Herring told the family friend, who had a falling out with Herring, but supports Warren's presidential bid. It is noted in the story that she never described her father as a janitor in her book, A Fighting Chance, but as a maintenance man.

There were other times before her presidential bid that she used the same description.

In a 2011 campaign video, she explained, "My dad sold carpeting and fencing and ended up as a maintenance man."

During a 2012 speech, she also described her father's job in such a way that is inconsistent with her current campaign trail description. “My father held a series of jobs, his last one was mowing lawns and cleaning swimming pools for an apartment house."

It sure seems that changing her father's job to "janitor" on the campaign trail is her way of trying to accentuate her modest upbringing… in a not so truthful way.

Of course, Elizabeth Warren is used to being dishonest about her origins, so playing loose with the facts about her dad's job is surely not that difficult for her.

https://pjmedia.com/election/elizabeth-warrens-brother-says-shes-lying-about-her-fathers-occupation-on-campaign-trail/

A "Market" Crash Is Baked In… Here's Why

Anyone looking at the hollowed-out, fragile shell of a Fed-managed "market" as a system realizes a crash that runs away from central planning control is already baked in.

The last thing punters and pundits expect is a stock "market" crash, yet a "market" crash is already baked in and here's why: real markets have internal resilience (they're anti-fragile, to use Nassim Taleb's phrase), and central-planning manipulated "markets" don't.

Few look at markets as obeying systems-level dynamics that have little to do with "news" or conventional metrics. The media makes money by reporting every tiny change in mood, metrics, rumors, etc., as if these drive markets. But we all know that the reality is much simpler: The Federal Reserve is the "market."

In other words, the "market" is no longer a functioning (real) market; it is a central-planning signaling utility of the Fed and other central banks. This hollowing-out of the real market in favor of a central-planning, top-down controlled "market" destroys the system-level functions of markets.

If you want a refresher on the legitimate functions of a market, please read The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good, which explains why all the hundreds of billions of dollars of top-down, central-planning "aid" to impoverished nations has failed, enriching kleptocrats and autocratic regimes while assuaging the guilt of the poverty-pimps in the IMF, UN, and all the philanthro-capitalist foundations.

The only programs that actually improve the lives of the impoverished are those that enable small-scale markets in which participants make their own decisions rather than suffer the consequences of decisions made by central-planners who not only know nothing of local conditions, they're uninterested in local conditions because we know best.

This is the core of central-planning: a handful of those with power make decisions that cripple markets' ability to respond to reality by allocating goods, services, capital and credit as participants see fit.

Centrally planned markets enrich the few at the expense of the many. This is as true of "markets" in developed nations as it is in kleptocratic developing economies. The Fed is akin to Soviet-era central planners, and the net result is the same: capital is grossly misallocated, distortions are optimized to enrich the few at the top, and the market's functionality is destroyed because it doesn't align with the goals of the central planners.

Central planning hollows out systems and increases fragility and vulnerability. Once a market has been gutted and turned into a centrally planned "market," it can no longer perform the key functions of markets: communicate information to all participants, discount flows of capital, goods and services, allocate capital, etc. These functions are what enable markets to alleviate poverty by increasing the wealth created by the free flow of information, goods, services, credit and capital.

Just as the collapse of the Soviet Union was baked in by the systemic fragilities of central planning, the Fed's commandeering of the stock market bakes in a crash. In systems-speak, central planning manifests as non-linear effects, i.e. the consequences are not proportional to the triggering events.

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2019/12/a-market-crash-is-baked-in-heres-why.html

Syrian Troops Confront US Military Convoy Near Tell Tamr

A fresh video showing Srian troops’ confrontation with a US miltiary convoy near Tell Tamr appeared online. The video shows a unit of the Syrian Army in a verbal engagement with the US troops after they stopped their convoy on a security check point.

“This time I will open [the road], but next time they will not pass unless they coordinate with the friends [Russians] … And tell him you are an occupier, you will leave today, tomorrow, you will leave,” the Syrian soldier says on the video.

This is not the first time when the Syrian Army limits the US military movements after the deployment in Syria’s northeast.

On December 12, a unit of the Syrian Army blocked a US military convoy from passing near the Qamishli Airport in the province of al-Hasakah. The Syrian Army forced US troops to turn around and make a ‘tactical withdrawal’.

https://southfront.org/syrian-troops-confront-us-military-convoy-near-tell-tamr-video/

Bill de Blasio to Increase NYPD Presence in Jewish Neighborhoods

Over the course of 48 hours this week, there were four anti-Semitic attacks in New York City. The city has been on high alert as it continues to face record numbers of anti-Semitism. Earlier this year, the New York Police Department said hate crimes doubled in 2019 compared to the previous year. The majority of those attacks were anti-Semitic.

In an effort to fix the ongoing issue, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Friday that he’s increasing police presence in three Jewish neighborhoods: Boro Park, Crown Heights, and Williamsburg.

“Hate doesn’t have a home in our city. In light of recent anti-Semitic attacks, the NYPD will increase their presence in Boro Park, Crown Heights, and Williamsburg. Anyone who terrorizes our Jewish community WILL face justice,” the Mayor wrote on Twitter Friday.

“In addition to heightened visibility, there will be increased visits to houses of worship and other critical areas in the community,” de Blasio wrote. “Anti-Semitism is an attack on the values of our city – and we will confront it head-on.”

https://saraacarter.com/bill-de-blasio-to-increase-nypd-presence-in-jewish-neighborhoods/

Trump Threatens Syria: Will POTUS Come to the Rescue of Al-Qaeda Terrorists in Idlib?

Trump wished the Syrian Arab Republic a belated Merry Christmas by tweeting yet another threat, warning the Syrian Armed Forces not to liberate Idlib from the approximately 10,000 al Qaeda terrorists who have occupied this area of the country, since the beginning of the crisis.

Surely the 45th President of the USA knows these stats, supported even by the same UN that also wails for al Qaeda on a regular basis. Surely Trump heard Special Presidential Envoy to the alleged anti-Daesh Global Coalition, Brett McGurk when he emphatically stated that Idlib province is the largest al Qaeda safe haven since 9/11.

The Trump threat comes on the heels of his signing the new NDAA law, which includes the Qatar-funded Caesar Hoax legislation, unprecedented peak colonialism which attempts to forbid Syria from protecting its citizenship from terrorists armed by NATO, within its own borders. The nasty Trump threat comes as Syria militarily enforces the Astana Agreement, already liberating more than 30 villages from the criminally insane al Qaeda savages.

Perhaps Trump is seeking a bump in his approval ratings; the only time that he was revered, cheered, practically fellated, was when he bombed Syria for al Qaeda, based on the criminal lies of the British illegal whose medical license was permanently revoked due to his terrorism ties, via fake news! CNN, on 7 April 2017.

British undoctor illegal, Shajul Islam was the source of the Khan Sheikhoun chemical hoax, 4 April 2017.

In the tweet where the POTUS threatens to again use the US military as al Qaeda’s second air force, Trump again gave his support to the caliph wannabe, rabid Erdogan, lying that the leader of Turkey — the country through which most of the 350,000 foreign killers entered, and without stepping on any of the almost 200,000 land mines still not cleared — was working to stop the carnage (“carnage” is a word he likes, having used it in his inaugural speech, when he promised that ”American carnage” would stop, though soon after, he flexed those “American carnage” muscles, bombing two bridges in Syria).

https://www.globalresearch.ca/trump-threatens-syria-will-potus-come-to-the-rescue-of-al-qaeda-terrorists-in-idlib/5698875

US Congress Approves Legislation to Wage a Hybrid “Humanitarian War” on Venezuela?

The 50-page-long section of the bill that codifies legislation about Venezuela is titled ‘‘Venezuela Emergency Relief, Democracy Assistance, and Development Act of 2019’’ or ‘‘VERDAD Act of 2019’’

Last December 16 both houses in the US approved the appropriation bill to be signed by president Trump. Aside from the mind-boggling amount of $1.4 trillion that was approved in total our interest was in looking at the details concerning Venezuela.

A press release issued by the organization Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) is quite misleading in its over optimism suggesting that the appropriations bill “rejects the use of force in Venezuela and endorses a negotiated solution to the country’s crisis”. Another interpretation may be more realistic.

The full bill of 1773 pages includes a section about Venezuela. The first reference to the country is to state that “not less than $30 million shall be made available for democracy programs for Venezuela” and that the funds “shall be made available for assistance for communities in countries supporting or otherwise impacted by refugees from Venezuela, including Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Curacao, and Trinidad and Tobago”. It is not possible to know if this is above the previously reported $52 million announced by Mark Green, the administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) last September. To make it more confusing the same report states that this “is in addition to hundreds of millions of dollars already committed by the US to support the more than 4 million vulnerable Venezuelans who have fled the country’s crisis.”

The 50-page-long section of the bill that codifies legislation about Venezuela is titled ‘‘Venezuela Emergency Relief, Democracy Assistance, and Development Act of 2019’’ or ‘‘VERDAD Act of 2019’’.

The legislation co-sponsored by senators Robert Menendez and Marco Rubio, was introduced last April in the Senate, and later referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations. That same April self-appointed interim president Juan Guaidó staged (another) coup at La Carlota air base in eastern Caracas and called for the military to rise up against Maduro in the hope that the military would defect in mass and join him. The timing of the legislation and the attempted coup may have been carefully planned to coincide, but the coup never happened.

Trump Has Venezuela in His Sights

https://www.globalresearch.ca/us-approves-bill-may-legislate-hybrid-warfare-venezuela/5698859

Search expands for missing Hawaii tour helicopter carrying 7

HONOLULU —

Rescuers resumed searching Friday for a tour helicopter carrying seven people that disappeared during a trip to one of the most rugged and remote coastlines in Hawaii.

A search that began Thursday night on the island of Kauai was expanded Friday morning, but the steep terrain, low visibility, choppy seas and rain made the effort challenging, the Coast Guard said.

“Those conditions are not ideal,” Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Sara Muir said. Rescue teams were “looking for any sign of the helicopter both on land and in the water and along the coastline.”

The helicopter company, identified as Safari Helicopters, contacted the Coast Guard about 45 minutes after the aircraft was due back from a tour of Kauai’s Na Pali Coast on Thursday evening, a Coast Guard statement said.

The Eurocopter AS350 helicopter took off from the town of Lihue, Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said Friday.

The helicopter has an electronic locator, but no signals had been received, according to the Coast Guard.

The helicopter was carrying a pilot and six passengers, two of whom were believed to be minors, the Coast Guard said.

Clouds and rain at the scene limited visibility to 4 miles, with winds at 28 mph. Friday’s forecast predicted winds were at about 23 mph.

A rescue helicopter and crew were launched from Coast Guard Air Station Barbers Point, and additional support was provided by the Navy Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron 37 at Kaneohe Bay. A Coast Guard cutter and crew were also launched from Honolulu.

Local fire officials planned to launch their own search efforts. Commercial helicopter companies and all-terrain vehicle crews were also being deployed.

Towering mountains and steep, deep ravines and cliffs line the coast.

“There are beaches along the Na Pali coastline, but we are experiencing periods of very high water, so exactly how much beach may be available I couldn’t tell you,” Muir said.

Helicopter tours are common on the island of Kauai, much of which is made up of remote state parks.

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-12-27/coast-guard-tour-helicopter-carrying-7-missing-in-hawaii

Chinese national arrested for taking photos at Naval Air Station in Key West

The day after Christmas, a Chinese man rose early because, he said, he wanted to take photographs of the sunrise on the grounds of the Naval Air Station in Key West.

It was only a matter of time before witnesses spotted Lyuyou Liao at 6:50 a.m. Thursday walking around a perimeter fence and entering the military facility from the rocks along the water. They warned Liao that he was trespassing in a restricted area, known as the Truman Annex, as he took photographs of government buildings near “sensitive military facilities,” according to a federal criminal complaint filed Thursday.

Then, U.S. Military Police saw him snapping photos with the camera on his cellphone, approached him and took a look at the pictures. The police officers immediately called a federal agent, who arrested Liao on a charge of entering Naval property for the purpose of photographing defense installations.

Liao agreed to waive his Miranda rights and told the agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service in broken English that “he was trying to take photographs of the sunrise,” according to the complaint affidavit. But when Liao provided the pass code to his cellphone and allowed the agent to look at the images, he “observed photographs of Truman Annex on the camera.”

Liao, 27, will have his first federal court appearance Friday afternoon in Key West via a video hookup with Magistrate Judge Patrick Hunt in Fort Lauderdale and Assistant U.S. Attorney Karen Gilbert in Miami. The hearing will address whether he wants to hire his own lawyer or have one appointed by the judge. A detention hearing and arraignment will be held later.

Liao’s arrest marks the second time since last year that a Chinese national has been charged with taking photos of defense installations at the Naval Air Station in Key West

In September of last year, Zhao Qianli, who claimed to be a music student from China, got caught by the Key West police for trespassing onto the high-security Naval Air Station. He later told federal authorities that he lost his way on the tourist trail and did not realize it was a military base.

Investigators found photos and videos on Qianli’s cellphone as well as on his digital camera that he had taken of government buildings and a Defense Department antenna field on the military base.

Qianli, 20, pleaded guilty in February to one count of photographing defense installations at the Key West military facility and was sentenced to one year in prison by U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore. The judge gave him the maximum sentence, which was higher than the sentencing guidelines between zero and six months. The U.S. attorney’s office sought nine months in prison.

The following March, a Chinese woman was arrested at President Donald Trump’s private club in Palm Beach after she bluffed her way into Mar-a-Lago to attend a purported “United Nations friendship” event that she knew had been canceled before she left China.

Yujin Zhang, 33, was charged with trespassing in a restricted area and lying to a federal agent. In September, Zhang was convicted at trial and sentenced in November to eights months in prison — or the time she had been in custody since her arrest — by U.S. District Judge Roy Altman.

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/article238749763.html#storylink=cpy

US Sanctions Backfire: Russia's Gazprom & Ukraine Make Landmark Deal

Sanctions-happy Washington continues to aid in a slow rapprochement between Russia and Ukraine. Ironically enough, at moment the US is demanding Nord Stream 2 contractors to lay down their tools and wind-down operations "immediately" or face further sanctions, there's been an unprecedented breakthrough in the standoff between Russian state energy giant Gazprom and Kiev:

Of course the other supreme irony is that Washington has claimed all along to be acting in Ukraine and Europe's best interest, but it appears no one is getting the message.

As we detailed earlier this week, Allseas, the Swiss company that is Nord Stream’s main contractor, confirmed its workers as well as partner contractors have laid down their tools; however, others have pressed forward as the project is very near completion, also as both Gazprom and the Nord Stream 2 project spokesman have promised to finish. Gazprom says its retrofitting its own ships to take over the bulk of pipeline laying that Allseas was overseeing.

https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/us-sanctions-backfire-russias-gazprom-ukraine-make-landmark-deal

Italian Company Wins $1.3Bln Contract to Build 4 Warships for Saudi Arabia - Fincantieri

An Italian shipbuilding company will construct four new warships for Saudi Arabia within a consortium led by Lockheed Martin at a shipyard in the US Midwest, Fincantieri Marinette Marine (FNN) said in a press release on Friday.

"The US Navy awarded a Lockheed Martin-led team, which includes Fincantieri Marinette Marine, a multi-billion dollar order for the construction of four Multi-Mission Surface Combatants ships," the release said. "These ships will be for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia."

Fincantieri will build the ships at the Marinette yard in the US state of Wisconsin under the Foreign Military Sales program, the release noted.

"The now-definitized contract has a total value of approximately $1.3 billion dollars for Fincantieri Marinette Marine," the release said.

The Multi-Mission Surface Combatant is a manoeuvrable surface warship designed with a mono-hull and a range of 5,000 nautical miles and speeds in excess of 30 knots, the release added.

https://sputniknews.com/military/201912271077884313-italian-company-wins-13bln-contract-to-build-4-warships-for-saudi-arabia—fincantieri/

>>7633300

>>7632909

Guardian, Atlantic contributor acts as a Syrian terrorist mouthpiece on Twitter, and if you don’t like it you’re a Russian stooge

Giving a sympathetic platform to a terrorist is reprehensible at best, downright criminal at worst, and definitely a bad look for a ‘respected’ media contributor. Oh, it’s for bashing Assad and the Russians? Go ahead, then.

A funny thing happened recently on Twitter. A journalist who contributes to the Guardian, Foreign Policy and the Atlantic tweeted—in a long thread peppered with photos of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the leader of an Al-Qaeda branch in Syria—about “the force that dominates” Idlib. Hassan Hassan's initial tweet coyly avoided mentioning that this force is Al-Qaeda in Syria.

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/476980-syria-terrorists-media-platform/