Bingo

Ex-London Mayor Says Time to Cut Policy Ties

It’s time for the UK to have an independent foreign policy and stop being a cheerleader for Washington, says former London mayor, Ken Livingstone. But politicians know that posing a threat to US interests may end badly for you, he told RT.

[...]

“Ever since the end of the WW1 Britain and America have intervened all of the Middle East to control the flow of oil. It's been the center of their economy. They put up completely corrupt regimes, they overthrew democratically elected ones, like in Iran in 1953. We've just had a hundred years of Western intervention. And the tragedy is, when you look at the loss of life and what it cost us, we would have been better off if we paid an honest price for the oil, having the Arab countries sell it themselves."

  RT

Just what I keep saying: we'd come out ahead if we just bought the oil. However, that would mean we were not in control of the oil, and we really need to be, because if we don’t control the oil, we can’t control who gets it, and that means loss of control of other countries by means of regulating the flow of oil. No, definitely the loss of life and cost are worth it to the US elites and corporations running the show.

Livingstone believes that if a UK Prime Minster stands up to represent Britain’s interests and “not just be a cheerleader for the United States,” there will be huge public support, as people are overwhelmingly opposed to any more involvement in America's wars in the Middle East.

They won’t do it. And why?

"Everyone coming out from the political system knows: if you pose a threat to the American interest, you might be destabilized, there might be a smear campaign or you might even have a nasty accident. An awful lot of people who challenge American interest seem to die..."

What’s more, he said that all the main newspapers and media outlets in Britain are owned by a few billionaires and give unwavering support to America’s interests despite the loss of “thousands of British lives.”

Not to mention the reporters.

Livingstone said the tragic irony is that the rise of the Islamic State and Islamic extremism in general stems from the Western policies in the last decades.

"This is the tragedy of the last 30-40 years. When we had this growth of extremism in the Muslim world it was actually broadly funded by the Saudi-Arabians and the Americans so that Russia would be drawn into war in Afghanistan. If you actually look at the records, the CIA went to see Jimmy Carter in his office in the White House in the summer of '79. They said: if you fund these fundamentalist Muslims, Russia will have to intervene, it'll become new Vietnam. And they fell into that trap.”

And now look who’s getting their hands on oil in Syria…someone we can’t bully.

Election Time Again

Germany Yields a CIA Whistleblower

Members of the German media are paid by the CIA in return for spinning the news in a way that supports US interests [...] according to a new book by Udo Ulfkotte, a former editor of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, one of Germany's largest newspapers.

[...]

The allegations, while shocking, are consistent with the CIA's long and well-established history of media infiltration.

Operation Mockingbird, which began in the 1950s, was a secret CIA operation which recruited journalists to serve as mouthpieces for the American government. The program was officially terminated after it was exposed by the famous Church Committee investigations, but evidence of ongoing CIA influence over the media continues to accumulate.

  Russia Insider

"Officially terminated."

The former editor [Udo Ulfkotte] of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, which is one of Germany’s largest newspapers, was secretly on the payroll of the CIA and German secret service, spinning the news in a way that was positive for the United States and bad for its opponents.

[...]

"We’re talking about puppets on a string, journalists who write or say whatever their masters tell them to say or write. If you see how the mainstream media is reporting about the Ukraine conflict and if you know what's really going on, you get the picture. The masters in the background are pushing for war with Russia and western journalists are putting on their helmets."

  Russia Insider

Now that he has abandoned not just the anti-Islamic but the anti-Russian elements of traditional German culture, he no longer is welcomed among the conservative Germans who had helped him to build, and then, for decades, to advance, his successful long career as a ‘journalist,’ but which he now calls “propagandist.”

[...]

Ulfkotte’s book “offers a multitude of cases, names, and examples of manipulation of German public opinion orchestrated by the U.S. embassy in Germany and by various international entities.”

  Washington’s Blog

Here’s an interview with Ulfkotte explaining his new attitude.



Ulfkotte's book (currently #7 on Germany's best sellers list) has not yet been translated and is available only in German. And I’m not surprised that I don’t seem to be finding any reference to it in the American mainstream press...nor any of the top blogs or online journals. It comes to us through the reporting of Peter Oliver for news outlet Russia Today (and not even on their website).

Rough Times

As Ukraine prepares for parliamentary elections at the end of the month, a series of so-called "trash bucket challenges" are spreading across the country.

Activists, many from the far right, are throwing politicians whom they say are corrupt into rubbish bins.

Some of them have been brutal, and one official was also severely beaten. Critics have called the actions mob justice, and ask what this means for the rule of law in Ukraine in the future.

  BBC

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Gaza Dying

Ahem

I can agree with that. But this is Mohammed's Twitter pic:

Technically not a selfie, but I wouldn't give it any grace for difference.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

How to Keep the News Media Away

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) imposed a 12-day no-fly zone in compliance with requests from local [Ferguson, Missouri] police after protests erupted in response to the August 9th police shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teen. At the time, the official reason given for the restriction was safety precautions.

  RT

Not that anyone believed that. Were there rioters in the sky?

The St. Louis Police department maintained that the restricted fly zone was instituted in response to shots fired at a police helicopter, although they were not able to provide an incident report on the shooting, according to AP.

Next time, they’ll make sure there actually are shots fired at the police helicopter.

FAA air traffic controllers attempted to reword the flight ban, which had initially banned all air traffic in the 37-mile radius, to let commercial flights operate at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, but prohibit other flights, on August 12th, the day after the restriction was first established. Effectively putting an end to media presence in the skies, the amended restriction read, “Only relief aircraft operations under direction of St. Louis County Police Department are authorized in the airspace. Aircraft landing and departing St. Louis Lambert Airport are exempt.”

What’s left? Private planes and news choppers.

An FAA manger was recorded saying that the police “did not care if you ran commercial traffic through this TFR (temporary flight restriction) all day long. They didn’t want media in there.”

[...]

Michael Huerta, an FAA administrator, denied the national agency was compliant in banning media from Ferguson airspace.

“FAA cannot and will never exclusively ban media from covering an event of national significance, and media was never banned from covering the ongoing events in Ferguson in this case,” he said in statement on Sunday.

Riiiiight.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Who's Afraid of Ray McGovern?

75-year-old [ex-CIA anylist Ray] McGovern was blocked from entering [an event featuring retired Gen. David Petraeus], was roughly put under arrest, and was held overnight in jail. He described his ordeal in an interview with RT, saying “I was warned as soon as I got to the ticket-taker, ‘Ray, you’re not welcome here.’”

[...]

He was hauled off to a local precinct and charged with resisting arrest, criminal trespass and disorderly conduct. He said he spent the night on a stainless steel cot.

[...]

McGovern, who was arrested by New York City police on Thursday night to prevent him from attending a speech by retired Gen. and ex-CIA Director David Petraeus, told me the day before that he was planning to ask a question during the Q-and-A.

McGovern, who writes regularly for Consortiumnews.com, compared his goal in New York to his famous questioning of then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in Atlanta in 2006 when McGovern pressed Rumsfeld on false statements he had made about Iraq’s WMD and ties to al-Qaeda.

[...]

McGovern told RT that he had planned to ask Petraeus, who was responsible for training the Iraqi army, about his failure to train those forces sufficiently to stand up to a recent offensive by the Islamic State.

  Robert Parry: Consortium News

Apparently the venue was not a free speech zone.

I believe this is a good definition of a political prisoner.

You can read that whole article for details about Petraeus’ hand in the disastrous decisions by both Bush and Obama that has been the Iraq quagmire.

 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

So, Israel CAN Be Pressured

Israel has reopened the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem’s Old City after its closure sparked protests and calls to reopen from countries, including the United States. Muslim men under the age of 50 are still barred from participating in prayers today over supposed security concerns.

  Democracy Now!