Tony Cartalucci

Image: (via The Guardian) "Chemical containers in the Libyan desert. There are concerns unguarded weapons could fall into the hands of Islamist militants. Photograph: David Sperry/AP" As increasing evidence reveals Libyan fighters and weapons are pouring into Syria, the West has been preparing to cover up the inevitability that Libya's chemical arsenal will also found its way into the besieged nation. It now appears that such weapons are being deployed by NATO's terrorist proxies.

Chemical weapons reportedly used by NATO-armed, funded terrorists near Damascus.

PressTV has reported (more details via Fars News) that chemical weapons have been used by militants fighting Syrian government forces in Daraya, near Damascus. PressTV also reported that threats have been made against Syria's ethnic minorities that their water supplies will be poisoned by militants - this on the heels of the UN itself warning of (and preemptively spinning) impending sectarian-driven genocide.

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Stephen Lendman

President Shimon Peres meets with US Senator John Kerry at the
President's Residence in Jerusalem in May 2012.

Jew or gentile matters less than supporting America's imperium. Kerry's fully on board. His job entails being Israel's man at State.

The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE) is a pro-Israeli front group. It promotes strengthening US/Israeli ties. Its executive director, Mitchell G. Bard, formerly was AIPAC's Near East Report editor. Earlier he was polling division senior analyst for GHW Bush. He's featured prominently on US scoundrel TV. Best to avoid him entirely.

AICE publishes the Jewish Virtual Library (JVL). It's an online pro-Israeli resource. It wholeheartedly supports John Kerry. Using material from his 2004 presidential campaign bid, it said:

He's "been at the forefront of the fight for Israel's security" throughout his Senate tenure. He endorses "strengthening Israel's security and bolstering the US-Israel special relationship." "His pro-Israel voting record is second to none." "John Kerry will never do anything to compromise (Israel's) security." He's committed to a "special relationship." His support for Israel is "unwavering." He endorses "Israel's right to respond to terrorism - including against Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist groups in Gaza." He backs "continued assistance in strengthening Israel's homeland defenses." He called Arafat "a failed leader and unfit partner for peace and therefore supported his total isolation." He "demanded a new, responsible Palestinian leadership, committed to ending the violence and fighting terror." He wholeheartedly supports generous Israeli foreign aid. In the early 1990s, he wanted more than GHW Bush planned to give. He always believed that America "must stand solidly behind Israel at the UN and other international organizations."

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Michael Snyder

Do you have faith in the people running this nation? When answering that question, most people would bash either the Democrats or the Republicans, but my question goes much deeper than that. Power is constantly shifting back and forth between the two major political parties, and it seems like things don’t really change no matter who is in power. What I am asking is if you have faith in the entire system. Do you have faith in the U.S. government, the Federal Reserve, the state governments, the local governments, our public schools and our financial system? Do you believe that the people that are running things in this country are doing a good job? When you look at the results, it is hard to argue that those in power are making good decisions. In fact, this country is caught in such a downward spiral that it would be easy to argue that most of our politicians should immediately resign in disgrace. Our leaders just keep coming up with one bad idea after another. Sometimes it almost seems as though it would be better for our leaders to do absolutely nothing at all because every time they try to do something they only make things worse.

Posted below are a few dozens questions that reveal the stupidity of the people running this nation. The truth is that the list below could be much, much longer. If the founders of this nation could see us now they would be absolutely disgusted with us.

As you read the following list of questions, try to think about what the answers might be….

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Wayne Madsen

Kerry’s Southeast Asia war experience and U.S. - China ties

To say that departing U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton soured U.S.-Chinese relations with her constant saber-rattling rhetoric about China’s intentions in East Asia is an understatement. China’s new leadership will be closely examining the record of prospective Secretary of State John Kerry, a Navy SEAL officer during the Vietnam War, for past statements decrying America’s military intervention in Southeast Asia. How Kerry responds to growing friction between China and neighboring nations over maritime waters and island disputes may reflect his past experiences in fighting in an unpopular war in Asia and his later activism against such future wars involving America.

One of Mrs. Clinton's lasting legacies from her time as Secretary of State is her penchant for encircling China with governments that are advancing America's interests in the region. For example, Clinton’s use of India to confront China in the South China Sea officially avoided getting the United States involved militarily in the Sino-Southeast Asian maritime conflict while assuring claimant countries like the Philippines and Vietnam that other non-claimant naval powers like India, in addition to Australia, have stakes in the maritime dispute with China.

However, it is the future of Sino-Japanese relations, especially with the advent of a right-wing revanchist Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) government in Tokyo and a new and younger Chinese government willing to flex China’s new-found financial and military might that poses the greatest challenges and risks for a Secretary of State Kerry.

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Ellen Brown

The “fiscal cliff” has all the earmarks of a false flag operation, full of sound and fury, intended to extort concessions from opponents. Neil Irwin of the Washington Post calls it “a self-induced austerity crisis.” David Weidner in the Wall Street Journal calls it simply theater, designed to pressure politicians into a budget deal:

The cliff is really just a trumped-up annual budget discussion. . . . The most likely outcome is a combination of tax increases, spending cuts and kicking the can down the road.

Yet the media coverage has been “panic-inducing, falling somewhere between that given to an approaching hurricane and an alien invasion.” In the summer of 2011, this sort of media hype succeeded in causing the Dow Jones Industrial Average to plunge nearly 2000 points. But this time the market is generally ignoring the cliff, either confident a deal will be reached or not caring.

The goal of the exercise seems to be to dismantle Social Security and Medicare, something a radical group of conservatives has worked for decades to achieve. But with the recent Democratic victories, demands for “fiscal responsibility” may just result in higher taxes for the rich, without gutting the entitlements.

The problem is that no deal is going to be satisfactory. If we go over the cliff, taxes will be raised on everyone, and GDP is predicted to drop by 3%. If a deal is reached, taxes will be raised on some people, and some services will be cut. But the underlying problems – high unemployment and a languishing economy – will remain. More effective solutions are needed.

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Stephen Lendman

Previous articles explained fiscal cliff duplicity in detail. At issue is destroying America's social contract. Both parties agreed early in Obama's first term. They plan killing it incrementally by a 1,000 cuts.

Class war rages. Private wealth and power are pitted against essential public needs. Property rights, individualism, and free-market mumbo jumbo hammer ordinary people mercilessly. Neoliberal harshness reflects it. Warren Buffet once said, "There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's winning."

Obama, Boehner and complicit congressional leaders agree. Plans are to give corporations and America's privileged class more. Unprecedented wealth extremes will widen. Public needs will grow. Shared sacrifice is one-way. Both parties concur. Obama and Boehner publicly dance around what both leaders agreed on months or years ago. Media scoundrels pretend otherwise.

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Paul Craig Roberts

I have known for a long time that US news is agenda-driven. Tonight (December 18) I was made aware of the extent to which agenda-driven US news drives the news of the rest of the world.

For reasons unbeknownst to me, Russia Today Moscow requested a live TV interview via Skype about the Newtown, Connecticut, school shootings that killed 20 young children and several adults. I was interested to know what was Moscow’s interest in the shootings, and I agreed to the interview.

I was surprised to see that RT Moscow’s interest was to spread the official US story of the shootings and to ask me if I thought “assault weapons” would be banned as a consequence.

Many things can be an assault weapon. A baseball bat, a knife, a fist, a foot, a single shot .22 rifle, a double-barrel shotgun, a fireplace poker, a six-shot revolver, a brick, a sword, a bow and arrow, a lance. A person can add many items to this short list.

Gun-control advocates have defined “assault weapon” to be a semi-automatic civilian version of military weapons, such as AR-15, the civilian version of the military M-16, and AK-47. During the Clinton administration the civilian version of these weapons was not permitted to have various harmless features because the features made the rifles have a military appearance, and the weapons were restricted to magazines that held no more than ten rounds.

Today 20 and 30 round magazines are available. For a professional, the capacity of the magazines is immaterial. With experience a person can change clips in a second. A button is pushed, the clip drops out and a new one is inserted. For reasons hard to follow, gun control advocates think that a ten-round clip turns an “assault weapon” into something else.

I told RT Moscow that the United States was the most complete police state in human history. Thanks to modern technology, Washington is able to spy on its subjects far beyond the capabilities of Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. Even George Orwell’s imagination in his dystopian novel, 1984, has been surpassed by Washington’s current practice. The “war on terror” is the excuse for the American Police State.

A police state, I said, was inconsistent with an armed population, and as all other constitutional amendments have fallen, the sole remaining amendment, the Second Amendment, will not survive much longer.

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Eric Peters

"[A large amount of] ammunition has been solicited by the DHS. Within the next 4 years, they expect to acquire 200,000 million rounds of .223 rifle bullets. For training snipers, DHS have ordered two types of .308 caliber rounds – blanks and 168 grain hollow point boat tail ammunition. This new purchase adds to the 1.8 billion rounds of ammunition they have solicited for months in preparation for...something." (Susanne Posel)

If guns are bad, how come all high politicians – including Dear Leader Obama and Gauleiter Bloomberg – are surrounded by heavily armed guards? If guns are bad, how come there is never a mass shooting at a police station?

There is virtually no “gun crime” in Switzerland, even though the Swiss are armed to the teeth, with full-auto military combat rifles in the hands of nearly every adult male between the ages of 18 and 45?

Guns save so many lives each year – including most recently the lives of numerous potential victims of a mass shooting in Oregon at the Clackamas Town Center Mall, where concealed carry permit holder Nick Meli confronted armed killer Jacob Tyler Roberts – who had already shot two people dead … and prevented him from shooting more people dead?

Rural areas tend to have high concentrations of guns relative to urban areas – yet “gun crime” is inexorably higher in urban areas while it is almost nonexistent in the rural areas...

If guns are bad, how come concealed carry permit holders are less likely to be involved in an unjustified (non-defensive) shooting than a cop? If guns are bad, how come the Obama administration “walked” 2,000 high-powered rifles to Mexican drug cartels?

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Stephen Lendman

A previous article explained what's at stake. Both parties agree on destroying America's social contract. Fiscal cliff hokum conceals their agenda. Media scoundrels don't explain.

Ongoing debate refers to expiring yearend tax breaks and unemployment benefits. Automatic sequestered/largely discretionary yearend $1.2 trillion in cuts address them for starters. Trillions more will follow.

Bipartisan agreement occurred long ago. Daily reports conceal what's ongoing and planned. Ordinary households will be hardest hit.

Wall Street, war profiteers, other corporate favorites, and America's super-rich can rest easy. Their gain is middle and poor America's loss.

It's baked in the cake and agreed. Final language remains to be reported. Expect something by yearend or sooner. Headline news won't explain what's happening and why it matters.

The New York Times reflects scoundrel media misreporting. It conceals what readers most need to know. Its November 9 editorial headlined "The Fiscal Cliff Opener," saying:

Voters "re-elected a president who promised to fight for higher taxes on the wealthy, for more public investment and for careful cuts in spending."

"Three days later, President Obama challenged Republicans to extend the Bush tax cuts for the middle class, right now, and said he would not accept a deal that does not require the wealthy to pay a bigger share."

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Stephen Lendman

As issue is destroying social America, increasing the unprecedented wealth disparity, punishing ordinary households, impoverishing growing millions, and providing limitless funding for militarism, imperial wars, and corporate favorites. Also ahead is toughening police state harshness against non-believers. America's at the precipice of full-blown tyranny.

Washington's fiscal cliff debate is doublespeak deception. Republicans and Democrats share guilt. Language refers to expiring year end tax breaks and unemployment benefits. It's also about sequestered/largely discretionary year end $1.2 trillion in cuts coming to address them. Republicans and Democrats share guilt. Backroom double-dealing planned them months ago. The criminal class in Washington is bipartisan. It's perhaps worse now than ever. Details alone remain working out. Both parties are in lockstep on policy. "Thirdworldizing" America is planned.

A previous article said only Republican Nixon could go to China when America had no diplomatic relations. Only Democrat Obama dares end America's decades-long social contract. His mandate is eliminating government's responsibility for Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and publicly-funded pensions. Straightaway in office, he attacked social America. He promised deep cuts. He sold out constituents who expected better. He did what they thought impossible.

Another article said he matched Star Trek. He went where no administration went before. Imagine what's ahead in term two. He's unrestrained. He'll throw America's most disadvantaged and middle class under the bus. Expect him to take full advantage. In 2010, his Simpson-Bowles National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (NCFRF) recommended deep Medicare cuts, higher Medicaid co-pays, and restrictions on filing malpractice suits, among other ways to end Washington's responsibility for healthcare incrementally.

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Philip Giraldi

If there is one word missing from the United States government’s post-9/11 lexicon it is “accountability.” While perfectly legal though illicit sexual encounters apparently continue to rise to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors, leading to resignations, no one has been punished for malfeasance, torture, secret prisons, or extraordinary renditions. Indeed, the Obama administration stated in 2009 that it would not punish CIA torturers because it prefers to “look forward and not back,” a decision not to prosecute that was recently confirmed by Attorney General Eric Holder in two cases involving the deaths of detainees after particularly brutal Agency interrogations. What the White House decision almost certainly means is that the president would prefer to avoid a tussle with the Republicans in congress over national security that would inevitably reveal a great deal of dirty laundry belonging to both parties.

The bipartisan willingness to avoid confrontation over possible war crimes makes the recently completed 6,000 page long Senate Intelligence Committee report on CIA torture an extraordinary document. Though it is still classified and might well never see the light of day even in any sanitized or bowdlerized form, its principal conclusions have been leaking out in the media over the past two weeks. It directly addresses the principal argument that has been made by Bush administration devotees and continues to be advanced regarding the CIA torture agenda: that vital information obtained by “enhanced interrogation techniques” led to the killing of Osama bin Laden. According to the report, no information obtained by torture was critical to the eventual assassination of the al-Qaeda leader, nor has it been found to be an indispensable element in any of the other terrorism cases that were examined by the Senate committee. What exactly does that mean?

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Philip Giraldi

The Kagans in Basra, Iraq

The Beltway power couple who boosted the Iraq invasion insist we stay longer in Afghanistan.

A recent op-ed in the Washington Post by Kimberly and Fred Kagan argues “Why US troops must stay in Afghanistan.” The article demonstrates clearly that the number-crunching Kagans know exactly how many combat and support troops it takes to man an army base in Jalalabad and they pile Pelion on Ossa to demonstrate how a residual force of roughly 34,000 US soldiers can “continue to conduct counterterrorism operations in Southeast Asia” after 2014. They conclude “the United States can stabilize Afghanistan if it maintains around 68,000 US troops in Afghanistan into 2014, dropping to over 30,000 thereafter … the idea that the war is inevitably lost is a convenient mask behind which decision makers hide to deflect responsibility for pulling out troops who are making a real difference. We have argued that the current defeatism about Afghanistan is overdrawn and unfounded … .” We cannot “abandon the fight against al-Qaeda and its allies in South Asia.”

But the op-ed also demonstrates that the Kagans continue to be clueless over the question they raise in their title: “why” we Americans are in Afghanistan at all and they fail to demonstrate any understanding of how outside forces can impact on a limited military presence’s viability in a foreign land.

They make the same mistakes in their predictions of the likely course of developments as they did regarding Iraq. Like the Iraqis, the Afghans will have a say in their future and might not like the idea of continuing to grant legal immunity to a foreign occupying force. Nor does it appear that the perpetually rebuilding Afghan army will ever be battle ready, meaning that the American soldiers will become trapped in their bases, hostages to Afghan internal politics. Like it or not local sentiment does matter, even to a superpower, and it can serve to derail the best laid plans of the Kagans and Joint Chiefs of Staff.

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Bill Van Auken

Having first issued threats against the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad over unspecified intelligence regarding its chemical weapons, the Obama administration is now warning that these arms may fall into the hands of the “rebels” which Washington itself has backed.

This is the significance of a front-page article published this week by the Washington Post, which reported that, “US officials are increasingly worried that Syria’s weapons of mass destruction could fall into the hands of Islamist extremists, rogue generals or other uncontrollable factions.”

According to the Post, citing unnamed US officials, members of the Islamist militia, al-Nusra, which Washington has formally designated as a “foreign terrorist organization” and charged is an offshoot of Al Qaeda, overran “the Sheik Suleiman military base near Aleppo, where research on chemical weapons had been conducted” and were “closing in on another base near Aleppo, known as Safirah, which has served as a major production center for such munitions.”

While a decade ago, Washington prepared its invasion of Iraq by propagating lies about the regime of Saddam Hussein collaborating with Al Qaeda and a supposed threat he would supply the terrorist organization with “weapons of mass destruction,” today the Obama administration is floating a new and perverse pretext for war. It is raising the specter that its war for regime change in Syria might place such weapons into the hands of the Al Qaeda-linked forces that the US itself has both armed and strengthened in the bid to oust Assad.

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Paul Craig Roberts

The Derivatives Tsunami and the bond and dollar bubbles are of a different magnitude.

The “fiscal cliff” is another hoax designed to shift the attention of policymakers, the media, and the attentive public, if any, from huge problems to small ones.

The fiscal cliff is automatic spending cuts and tax increases in order to reduce the deficit by an insignificant amount over ten years if Congress takes no action itself to cut spending and to raise taxes. In other words, the “fiscal cliff” is going to happen either way.

The problem from the standpoint of conventional economics with the fiscal cliff is that it amounts to a double-barrel dose of austerity delivered to a faltering and recessionary economy. Ever since John Maynard Keynes, most economists have understood that austerity is not the answer to recession or depression.

Regardless, the fiscal cliff is about small numbers compared to the Derivatives Tsunami or to bond market and dollar market bubbles.

The fiscal cliff requires that the federal government cut spending by $1.3 trillion over ten years. The Guardian reports that means the federal deficit has to be reduced about $109 billion per year or 3 percent of the current budget. More simply, just divide $1.3 trillion by ten and it comes to $130 billion per year. This can be done by simply taking a three month vacation each year from Washington’s wars.

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Eric Peters

...because here it comes.

The bodies weren’t cold before the slaughter perpetrated by a single homicidal maniac became the basis for calls to slaughter the rights of millions of non-maniacs. That’s us, in case you missed it.

That 27 are dead is horrific, a nightmare. That the deaths of these innocents will be used to demagog gun ownership generally is arguably more so. For our rights – our liberties – are everything. Without them, our lives are nothing more than biological datum. We exist – but we do not live. Because it is not living when your life is controlled by others (those “others” being the people who control the machinery and enforcement apparatus of government) … when your freedom of action is denied, limited, constrained…. not because of any harm you’ve caused. But because someone else caused harm. And worse, because someone else might cause harm. For which you are to be held presumptively responsible.

This is the "logic" (poor word choice there) and the justification used for every abridgement of liberty we’ve suffered in recent memory. Someone might drive drunk. Therefore, anyone who happens to be out driving must submit to being treated as presumptively drunk driving – until they’ve demonstrated otherwise, to the satisfaction of armed and costumed goons. There might be a terrorist at the airport. So millions of innocent people trying to get someplace must submit to being handled – literally – as presumptive terrorists by armed, costumed goons. Purchase “too much” Sudafed – and you are presumed to be a confector of arbitrarily illegal “drugs.” And treated accordingly by armed, costumed goons – despite your having done nothing. That someone else might have done something is sufficient warrant to assume you did – or are about to. And to treat you as if you already had.

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