Playing with Dynamite & Nuclear War in the Balkans

In one of the more bizarre foreign policy announcements of a bizarre Obama Administration, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has announced that Washington will “help� Kosovo to join NATO as well as the European Union. She made the pledge after a recent Washington meeting with Kosovan Prime Minister Hashim Thaci in Washington where she praised the progress of the Thaci government in its progress in “European integration and economic development.�^[1]

Her announcement no doubt caused serious gas pains among government and military officials in the various capitals of European NATO. Few people  appreciate just how mad Clinton’s plan to push Kosovo into NATO and the EU is. Read more È

Rising Energy Tensions in the Aegean—Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Syria

The discovery in late 2010 of the huge natural gas bonanza off Israel’s Mediterranean shores triggered other neighboring countries to look more closely at their own waters. The results revealed that the entire eastern Mediterranean is swimming in huge untapped oil and gas reserves. That discovery is having enormous political, geopolitical as well as economic consequences. It well may have potential military consequences too.

Preliminary exploration has confirmed similarly impressive reserves of gas and oil in the waters off Greece, Turkey, Cyprus and potentially, Syria.

Greek ‘energy Sirtaki’

Not surprisingly, amid its disastrous financial crisis the Greek government began serious exploration for oil and gas. Since then the country has been in a curious kind of a dance with the IMF and EU governments, a kind of “energy Sirtaki� over who will control and ultimately benefit from the huge resource discoveries there. 

In December 2010, as it seemed the Greek crisis might still be resolved without the by-now huge bailouts or privatizations, Greece’s Energy Ministry formed a special group of experts to research the prospects for oil and gas in Greek waters. Greece’s Energean Oil & Gas began increased investment into drilling in the offshore waters after a successful smaller oil discovery in 2009. Major geological surveys were made. Preliminary estimates now are that total offshore oil in Greek waters exceeds 22 billion barrels in the Ionian Sea off western Greece and some 4 billion barrels in the northern Aegean Sea.[1] Read more È

The Shady National Endowment for Democracy &The Prime Agenda of ‘Whoever’ is Next US President

On December 8 several days after election results for Russia’s parliamentary elections were announced, showing a sharp drop in popularity for Prime Minister Putin’s United Russia party, Putin accused the United States and specifically Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of fuelling the Russian opposition protesters and their election protests. Putin stated, “The (US) Secretary of State was quick to evaluate the elections, saying that they are unfair and unjust even before she received materials from the Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (the OSCE international election monitors-w.e.) observers.�[1]

Putin went on to claim that Clinton’s premature comments were the necessary signal to the waiting opposition groups that the US Government would back their protests. Clinton’s comments, the seasoned Russian intelligence pro stated, became a “signal for our activists who began active work with the US Department of State.� [2]

Major western media chose either to downplay the Putin statement or to focus almost entirely on the claims of an emerging Russian opposition movement. A little research shows that, if anything, Putin was downplaying the degree of brazen US Government interference into the political processes of his country. In this case the country is not Tunisia or Yemen or even Egypt. It is the world’s second nuclear superpower, even if it might still be an economic lesser power. Hillary is playing with thermonuclear fire. Read more È

And why haven’t I done this before? As the saying goes ‘choose your enemies carefully’. How about ‘there’s so little time and so much to fight against’? Well, I’m sure you have heard various versions of those sayings and others, and you get my meaning, thus the reason I chose to remain fairly quiet on this important aspect of whistleblowing and whistleblowers.

It will take far more than one brief article/commentary to discuss and analyze the cases of ‘fairytale whistleblowers’ and the purpose of popping up and propping up those select whistleblowers with tremendous help and participation from the media-publishers-Hollywood, corporate-owned and government-managed NGOs. That’s right: it takes the entire village of establishment participants to create these fairytale whistleblowers, promote and market them, and succeed in selling them to the public as genuine. Thus, for the purpose of this warm-up, introduction, I am going to limit myself to a few macro points and examples.

The real whistleblower armed with information really dangerous to the establishment-government ends up with one or more of the following outcomes and consequences: mysterious death, prison, prosecution, persecution, gag order-blackmail- threats (including their family members), financial destruction, scandalization, censure, marginalization by the media-publishers… 

The fairytale whistleblower trap meets the exact opposite end: no ‘real’ threat of prosecution or imprisonment, no ‘real’ censorship-gag order, fame, enormous financial gain-reward, wide media coverage, hero-status granted by the media, mega dollars book and movie deal, position with big-name corporate-foundation owned and government-ruled NGOs, future high-dollar government contracts and positions, clear and present partisan status…

Okay, now I am going to move from the above general ground rules to a bit more specific distinction between real whistleblowers versus fairytale whistleblower traps. Read more È

In February we provided you with coverage of the brutalization and arrest of Veteran Ray McGovern during Hillary Clinton’s speech at George Washington University. McGovern had dared to stand up during the speech, peacefully and silently, in a Gandhi-endorsed way, expressing his stand. That was his crime deemed by our government deserving of being beaten up, brutalized, and arrested. As part of our coverage we also provided you with brief video footage of Mr. McGovern’s assault. Now, I want to ask you to watch this video clip one more time to observe a far more troubling trend captured by that same brief footage. A trend that did not receive any coverage; at least not that I know of. A trend that should alarm anyone with the tiniest shred of common sense,� an alarm that hopefully will translate into seeking an explanation and possible remedies. Here is the video again:
 

I hope you observed more than Hillary Clinton, McGovern’s peaceful protest, and his beating and dragging. If you didn’t, please click the ‘play’ button and watch it again. Do you see what I see? A room filled with supposedly bright and educated university students, and supposedly intellectual elite. A room full of our young on its way to becoming the educated new workforce – filling up positions; from government bureaucrats’ and diplomats’ desks to the pacers of our congressional halls; from the corporate ladder climbers to the NGO drivers…That’s right. The Jack Morton Auditorium at George Washington University was filled with over 200 such people.

What was the reaction of these more than 200 people, mostly senior students and professors, to the dragging, beating, and brutalization of a veteran who dared to silently stand up? Please tell me, what did they do? Maybe you have to watch it for the third time with this question, this context in mind. Please do it; it’s only 1 minute long. Do you see what I see?

That’s right. This audience simply glanced over their shoulders, registered the brutalization of a peaceful senior veteran with pure disassociation, no rage and zero sympathy, and then quickly turned their faces towards a woman engaged in hypocritical talk; as if ‘nothing’ had happened. Not a single student objected vocally to this police state practice before their very own eyes. Not a single academic stood up and left in protest. Not a single reporter commented or whispered a word. Not a single person reacted; period.

Who are these people? What type of youth are we seeing here? What kind of education system and university are we talking about? Forget political apathy. We are talking about alarming social apathy. And how did they get here? Institutionalized docility? Indoctrination towards a numb and dumb generation to be ruled and policed easily? A tranquilized youth and a robotic citizenry?

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Uzbekistan boils activists: we are okay with it. Heck, we even support ‘the Boilers. ’Azerbaijan tortures and murders journalists and activists: we are totally fine with it; in fact, we consider them our great ally . When Syria engages in human rights violations, we call them ‘evil.’ When Saudi Arabia does it we fortify it with more protection. Libya does it, and we say this and do this.  And then, when it comes to Bahrain here we are. You get the point, right? I am not talking about the need to intervene- I am pretty much an isolationist. This is what I am talking about: our hypocrisy and lies driven imperialistic foreign policy at work. And, here is the latest example:

Turkey leads world in jailing journalists, OSCE study finds
By Joshua Hamerman

Study finds Turkey surpasses Iran, China with 57 jailed journalists; reporters can be imprisoned for 3 years before being put on trial.

Fifty-seven journalists are imprisoned in Turkey – and between 700 and 1,000 ongoing trials could result in the imprisonment of more journalists there – according to a study by the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE), based in Vienna.

The International Press Institute stated that Turkey is now the country with the most imprisoned journalists, surpassing Iran and China. As of December, 34 journalists in both of those nations are in prisons.

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Yesterday, I posted a true Hillary Joke:

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged China to free dozens of government critics rounded up this year including a prominent artist and said Beijing’s rights record was worsening.

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“In China, we’ve seen negative trends that are appearing to worsen in the first part of 2011,” Clinton told reporters.”As we have said repeatedly, the United States welcomes the rise of a strong and prosperous China,” she said.”However, we remain deeply concerned about reports that since February, dozens of people including public-interest lawyers, writers, artists, intellectuals and activists have been arbitrarily detained and arrested.”

She mentioned the case of Ai Weiwei, an outspoken artist who helped design the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium for the 2008 Beijing Games. He was detained on Sunday for unspecified “economic crimes.”

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Will there be a peep from her on this generously funded, avidly managed and supported ally? Seriously, is there anyone out there who believes there indeed will be the slightest, even cosmetically intended, scold? Do we have any Obama-Clinton cult member who dares to bet? If there is, here I am; place your bet!

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Here is a round up with a few noteworthy developments and articles and an absurdity or two. This week Peter B Collins and I will be recording interviews with two special guests. It is going to be lively, interesting and I think rather controversial. Stay tuned.

The Conditional Antiwar Movement- Party Based AntiWar-ism

The following article is based on a new study showing that the antiwar movement in the US demobilized as Democrats, who had been motivated to participate by anti-Republican sentiments, withdrew from antiwar protests when the Democratic Party achieved electoral success. The findings are complementary (unfortunately) to my previous post on partisan & biased media reports. Ignorant & blinded partisanship in action: atrocious wars and major presidential abuses are all okay if committed by X Party, but awful and impeachable offenses if exercised by Y party.

Did Obama’s Election mean the End of the Anti-War Movement? 
By Bernie DeGroat, Spero News

As president, Obama has maintained the occupation of Iraq and escalated the war in Afghanistan,” said Heaney, U-M assistant professor of organizational studies and political science. “The antiwar movement should have been furious at Obama’s ‘betrayal’ and reinvigorated its protest activity.

“Instead, attendance at antiwar rallies declined precipitously and financial resources available to the movement have dissipated. The election of Obama appeared to be a demobilizing force on the antiwar movement, even in the face of his pro-war decisions.”

Heaney and Rojas analyzed the demobilization of the antiwar movement by using surveys of 5,400 demonstrators at 27 protests mostly in Washington, D.C., New York, Chicago and San Francisco from January 2007 to December 2009. The surveys asked questions on basic demographics, partisan affiliations, organizational affiliations, reasons for attending the events, histories of political participation, and attitudes toward the movement, war and the political system.

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A New Memo Reveals: FBI Had Mole Inside ABC News- Why the surprise?!

A recently declassified FBI memo reveals that a senior ABC News journalist acted (and performed) as a confidential informant to the bureau in the 1990s. I know this is significant, but shocking? That’s what I don’t understand. Do you?

Memo Suggests FBI Had Mole Inside ABC News in 1990s 
By John Solomon & Aeron Mehta

A once-classified FBI memo reveals that the bureau treated a senior ABC News journalist as a potential confidential informant in the 1990s, pumping the reporter to ascertain the source of a sensational but uncorroborated tip that the network had obtained during its early coverage of the Oklahoma City bombing.

The journalist, whose name is not disclosed in the document labeled “secret,� not only cooperated but provided the identity of a confidential source, according to the FBI memo — a possible breach of journalistic ethics if he or she did not have the source’s permission.

The ABC employee was even assigned a number in the FBI’s informant database, indicating he or she was still being vetted for suitability as a snitch after providing “highly accurate and reliable information in the past� and then revealing information the network had obtained in the hours just after the 1995 terrorist attack by Timothy McVeigh.

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More on Biased-Partisan Media & Double Standards

On Friday I published a brief commentary on the Lefts’ Hypocrisy when it comes to investigative reporting on the Obama administration’s atrocities nationally and internationally. Considering the level of controversy accompanied by lots of snarls, spits and insults, it must have struck a chord with ‘some people.’ Suddenly, these people forget my 7-year long battle during the Bush administration-the gag orders I received, polygraphs, being fired, secrecy…you name it. I used to be, back in the Bush days, their heroine, their respected whistleblower. Obama administration comes in, I see what goes on, I write about it and voice my opinion against the same atrocities, and suddenly I become the …hmmmmm, I am not going to use their x-rated and colorful adjectives. If I remember correctly, it started with this piece I wrote during the early Obama days: Two Sides of the Same Coin … Heads-Heads. No worries; I won’t be easily deterred. Here is another commentary on the Left’s double standards when it comes to ‘their’ president of wars-abuses: Read more È

Political donation laundering-rechanneling (PDLR) is a business in its own right, whether it is for pre-election donations or post-election maintenance contributions.  In most cases, PDLR requires savvy strategists and planners, quick-witted implementers, friends and enablers in high-places, and a high degree of creativity, almost to the point of being artistic. However, once in a while, an extraordinary situation may present itself, where neither imaginative planning nor creative strategy is necessary, and where limitless dollars can be channeled to Candidate A or Public Servant B or Representative C in plain sight. Really! In the PDLR world they call this the Miraculous Human Funnel. For the last ten years Former President Bill Clinton has been PDLR’s continuous miraculous funnel, and what a funnel he’s been, indeed!

Since leaving the White House in 2000, the Hillary-Bill Clinton duo have expanded their wealth by more than 100 fold to over $110 million dollars. In 2000 the Clintons left the White House with an $11 million dollar debt and annual income of $358,000. But within eight years, through ‘speaking fees,’ books, and a maze of ‘mysteriously smart investments,’ the couple’s net-worth exceeded one hundred million dollars. When asked, when pressed a little (only ‘a little’ thanks to the extreme kindness of US mainstream media when it comes to the Clintons), they attribute their ‘great fortune’ to the demand for Bill Clinton as the ‘Orator Extraordinaire.’

You see, there’s always been a certain degree of demand for former US presidents’ speeches, at least for those in the last three decades, but never anything like the bewildering demand for Bill Clinton; not even close; both in terms of the dollars per speech and the quantity of invitations. But then again, there has never been a former president in a very special situation like this; one with a wife as a senator (serving on the Committee on Armed Services among others) and later as Secretary of State. With a wife in such positions, no wonder the great demand, whether it is China or Kuwait or Columbia; whether it is Goldman Sachs or Citigroup or Sakura! Who said ‘Talk is Cheap’! The top players in the PDLR business circuit call him the ‘miracle funnel boy. Here is one example:

Many of Bill Clinton’s six-figure speeches have been made to companies whose employees and political action committees have been among Hillary Clinton’s top backers in her Senate campaigns. The New York investment giant Goldman Sachs paid him $650,000 for four speeches in recent years. Its employees and PAC have given her $270,000 since 2000 — putting it second on the list of her most generous political patrons.

The banking firm Citigroup, whose employees and PAC have been Hillary Clinton’s top source of campaign donations, with more than $320,000, paid her husband $250,000 for a speech in France in 2004. Last year, it committed $5.5 million for Clinton’s Global Initiative to help encourage entrepreneurship and financial education among the poor.

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Now interestingly, two-thirds of Bill Clinton’s speaking money came from foreign sources. Somehow, outside the United States clients are willing to pay even more to hear him speak! As for the timing ofthis foreign demand intensification: Read more È

I just received the following news and I am way too upset to write a coherent piece on this. Ray McGovern is a good friend of mine. We live less than 10 miles apart. Together we have participated in many events and protests. He is one of the most informed, articulate, gentle, peace-loving and peace-seeking human beings I’ve ever known…For me, this hits too close to home: My father was similarly brutalized by dictator regimes, and that was only the beginning, before it escalated to being tortured and having his toenails pulled out by the state police. Why? He was a doctor, a surgeon with an inquiring mind, and he spoke out whenever he could against dictatorships and for liberties. Participating in peaceful demonstrations, encouraging others to rise up for their rights, and reading authors such as Steinbeck (the American author black-listed there as ‘communist and anarchist’) landed him on the list of to-be-punished and pacified…
 
Right now, at this point, all I have to say to those who second-guess our nation’s police state status is this: “Shame on you!� As for my irate minority friends over here at Boiling Frogs, please help disseminate this news, because the scum bag media won’t;’ thank you.

At Clinton Speech: Veteran Bloodied, Bruised & Arrested for Standing Silently

As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave her speech at George Washington University yesterday, condemning governments that arrest protestors and do not allow free expression, 71-year-old Ray McGovern was grabbed from the audience in plain view of her by police and an unidentified official in plain clothes, brutalized and left bleeding in jail. She never paused speaking. When Secretary Clinton began her speech, Mr. McGovern remained standing silently in the audience and turned his back. Mr. McGovern, a veteran Army officer who also worked as a C.I.A. analyst for 27 years, was wearing a Veterans for Peace t-shirt.

Blind-sided by security officers who pounced upon him, Mr. McGovern remarked, as he was hauled out the door, “So this is America?” As you see, Mr. McGovern is covered with bruises, lacerations and contusions inflicted in the assault.

Mr. McGovern is being represented by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF). “It is the ultimate definition of lip service that Secretary of State Clinton would be trumpeting the U.S. government’s supposed concerns for free speech rights and this man would be simultaneously brutalized and arrested for engaging in a peaceful act of dissent at her speech,” stated attorney Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the PCJF.

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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has chosen a new special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan: a long-time controversial neocon, a man who has been famous for parading as a foreign agent in the lobby circuit, the scandalous former diplomat Marc Grossman. The not-so-gradual resurrection of the old neocon cabal under the Obama administration, led by Hillary Clinton, should not come as a surprise. According to Washington insiders, Richardl Perle and Douglas Feith have been consulted more than a few times in their ‘unofficial’ capacity, but are not far down in the queue to receive ‘official’ acknowledgement. This shouldn’t come as a surprise; at least to those who’ve been following the steady momentum building at the Obama White House towards a soon-to-come Neocon Easter.

Hillary Clinton appointed Dennis Ross as Special Advisor for the Persian Gulf and Southwest Asia; a man well-known as a hard-core neocon,  Paul Wolfowitz’ protégé, cofounder of the AIPAC sponsored Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and one of the loudest advocates for the Israel lobby. A man who is known to consider himself more Israeli than American; a Jewish American who is known to have spent ‘a lot of time’ in Israel to find his real identity-nationality.

We had Frederick Kagan, a neocon of choice for Mr. Obama, who was hired to manage General Petraeus on Afghanistan. A man whose father was born into a Jewish family in Lithuania; a man cherished by his bosses at the American Enterprise Institute; a man who authored the book, While America Sleeps, arguing in favor of a large increase in military spending and warned of future threats, including the imaginary WMD program in Iraq. We are talking about the man who was one of the main signatories of Project for the New American Century manifesto – the Neocon Bible. The man who was one of the Bush-Cheney administration’s favorite masterminds when it came to perpetual wars. Read more È