Saturday, December 31, 2016

Turkey Plane Transfers ISIS-Daesh Terrorists from Aleppo to Yemen: Report

A picture of Daesh fighters taken from one of the captives.

Yemeni sources say a Turkish plane transporting scores of Daesh Takfiri terrorists has landed in the Aden International Airport in southern Yemen.


Yemen’s al-Masirah news website reported that the plane carried 150 terrorists who were evacuated from Syria’s northwestern city of Aleppo after Syrian government forces fully retook control of the city.


On December 22, the Syrian army said Aleppo had completely returned to government control after the last batch of civilians and militants were evacuated.


Yemeni security sources said the terrorists landed in the airport that is under the supervision of Emirati forces, who are taking part in the Saudi military campaign against Yemen, the report added.




The Turkish plane, al-Masirah said, will take to Turkey 158 Saudi-backed mercenaries, who were injured in recent fighting with the Yemeni army and popular committees in Yemen’s province of Ta’izz. The injured are to receive treatment in Turkish hospitals.


Turkey is said to be among the main supporters of militant groups in Syria and stands accused of training and arming Takfiri elements and facilitating their passage into the country.


The Turkish government also reportedly supports the Saudi campaign against Yemen, which began in late March 2015 in a bid to restore power to Yemen’s Saudi-backed former President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.


Riyadh’s campaign has claimed the lives of more than 11,400 people, according to figures compiled by the Yemeni non-governmental monitoring group Legal Center for Rights and Development.



Argentina – El año que viviremos en peligro

mauricio-macri

Estimado lector:  sabemos que es 31 y estará pensando más en la cena de esta noche y recordando algo que le faltó comprar, que en la reflexión que aquí le vamos a proponer. Pero si logro captar su atención por un momento piense lo siguiente: seamos justos, a Alfonso Prat Gay habrá que reconocerle que efectivamente tenía un costado progresista que tan difícil era de advertir. Ese flanco “progre” está dado porque, al “dar un paso al costado”, le dejó al gobierno de Mauricio Macri una bomba muy difícil de desactivar. Pero antes de que salga corriendo a confundirse en un abrazo con Prat Gay, como el que se diera este último con su ahora medio sucesor Luis Caputo, cuando juntos festejaron en Nueva York la victoria de Paul Singer contra Argentina (va la foto para recordarlo), deje que le explique en qué consiste ese terreno resbaladizo y en pendiente por el que deberá transitar el gobierno durante este complejo 2017.


¿En qué condiciones dejó la economía Prat Gay y cómo sigue el gobierno a partir de ahora? La fotografía del momento admite distintas miradas, según desde dónde se pare el observador y en qué aspectos haga foco. Una mirada posible es la siguiente. Un año completo de gestión que arrancó con una fuerte devaluación, levantamiento de regulaciones en el mercado cambiario y en el comercio exterior, eliminación de retenciones y facilidades al libre movimiento de los capitales, sobre todo de salida. Bajo esas condiciones, se prometió una rápida reactivación de la economía, un aluvión de inversiones externas (¿alguien recuerda la promesa de los veinte mil millones de dólares que estaban comprometidos a ingresar “apenas se levantara el cepo”, que repetían Macri y Prat Gay?) y un mercado ávido por productos argentinos que, por fin, iban a poder a salir a ofrecerse al mundo, ese mundo del que Argentina se había alejado. El año de gestión terminó, en cambio, con un deterioro alarmante del mercado interno por caída del poder adquisitivo de la población (con fuerte traslado a precios de la megacorrección cambiaria), un déficit brutal del 6,8 por ciento del producto bruto (contabilizando también el pago de intereses, que el gobierno maquilla hablando de “déficit primario” con lo que baja en un par de puntos el desequilibrio), caída del PBI cercana al tres por ciento con la casi plenitud de ramas industriales en baja (sólo quedan con números a favor los derivados del complejo cerealero y oleaginoso: molienda, aceites y biocombustibles), desempleo en alza, cierre de empresas, suspensiones masivas de actividad durante el verano, retroceso de la inversión y una geométrica suba del endeudamiento externo.


Prat Gay pagó con su salida el costo de los platos rotos, de los que en realidad no es el único responsable. Pero si esas son las condiciones en que quedó la economía a su salida, ahora hay que ver cuál es la respuesta, la reacción del gobierno ante ese cuadro. La designación de Nicolás Dujovne en Hacienda y Luis Caputo en Finanzas, ex JP Morgan y hombre de absoluta confianza de Prat Gay, da una señal al respecto, así como las primeras palabras en funciones que pronunció el primero. El recién llegado definió la reducción del déficit  fiscal como su objetivo inmediato, pero también planteó metas de reformas estructurales, tanto en términos impositivos (una reforma que haga menos pesada la carga tributaria) como en el esquema de gastos e ingresos de las provincias (que las hagan menos demandantes de los recursos del Estado nacional).


La reacción que provocaron estos nombramientos en el frente industrial no es buena. Ven un gobierno preocupado por bajar el déficit fiscal antes que por la recuperación del empleo y la producción. Según algunos voceros industriales, “estos funcionarios no entienden a la industria”. Para otros, como Guillermo Moretti, “es un problema ideológico, estamos frente a un neoliberalismo que no se ha aggiornado, no ve ni entiende el mundo que lo rodea, que ya no crece en función del comercio exterior sino cuidando su mercado interno, y en cambio aquí se pone el eje en lo fiscal y en lo financiero y se deja en segundo plano la producción y el empleo”.


La palabra de Moretti, titular de la Federación Industrial de Santa Fe, es una de las más interesantes para escuchar dentro del espectro empresario que participa de la conducción de la UIA. Fue de los primeros en advertir sobre las graves consecuencias que tendría la apertura importadora de bienes manufacturados, y ayer fue una de las primeras reacciones que el autor de esta nota pudo recoger tras la primera intervención pública de Dujovne ya como ministro designado. “Si el nuevo ministro ya nos habla en contra del empleo público es que estamos en un problema; hay un gobierno, pero también un establishment, que son las empresas concentradas, los grandes medios, que creen en el camino del ajuste como salida. Yo creo que el interior está viviendo la plenitud de una crisis que en los centros urbanos, como la Capital Federal, todavía no se ve, pero que por este camino les va a llegar en pocos meses más”.


En pocos meses más, el país estará transitando la previa a las elecciones de medio término, programadas para octubre de este 2017. Seguramente la preocupación por no llegar a esas instancias en medio de una crisis económica haya apurado la salida de Prat Gay, cuando ya era palpable que su última promesa, la de los brotes verdes del segundo semestre, pasaba a ser una más de sus fallidas performances de profeta. Mauricio Macri, y quienes lo aconsejan, no creen que el problema sea el modelo, sino el desacople entre sus partes. Saben, porque ya han recibido señales desde el exterior, que una economía que entró en recesión masivamente, con desempleo y descontento social creciente, y desequilibrios en su balanza de pagos (más salida que entrada de dólares, aun con un resultado exitoso en el blanqueo, pero “por única vez”), y que ya durante 2016 se endeudó con el exterior en 45 mil millones de dólares, no es una plaza confiable. Máxime cuando los vientos en la plaza financiera internacional soplan en contra de las economías emergentes. Macri y los suyos creen que, una vez más, hay que dar “señales de confianza a los mercados”. Y esta señal, intuyen, es mostrar que son capaces de bajar el déficit.


Esta es la economía que deja Prat Gay cuando da su “paso al costado”. Una economía en crisis, fuertemente endeudada, y que en ocho meses dilapidó la “confianza” que había logrado devaluando, retirando controles de los mercados y firmándole un cheque en blanco a los buitres para que el juez Griesa le pusiera la cifra. El camino que le deja al gobierno, a partir de aquí, es resbaladizo y en pendiente porque ya casi no queda tiempo. Con las elecciones tan cercanas en el horizonte, ¿de qué forma se logra achicar el déficit sin pagar un enorme costo político por las consecuencias sociales que provoque?. Dujovne ya dejó entrever cuál es su repuesta: no es aumentar impuestos, al contrario. Por lo tanto, el ajuste va a venir por el lado de reducción del gasto y de las transferencias, tanto a provincias como a sectores sociales que reciben subsidios.


Dujovne y Caputo serán los brazos de un mismo cuerpo, encargado de obtener los recursos para que este modelo neoliberal siga funcionando. Es decir, pueda seguir recibiendo crédito del exterior mientras no salga de la crisis interna. Las propias fuentes oficiales hablan de una necesidad de financiamiento de 60 mil millones de dólares del exterior para 2017. Los que tienen algún acceso a los mercados financieros globales aseguran que, en las actuales condiciones, Argentina no podrá repetir ni siquiera el financiamiento de 45 mil millones que obtuvo en el año que culmina, incluso pagando mayor tasa. El gobierno cree tener la llave: si baja el déficit, se le abrirán las puertas del crédito otra vez en forma irrestricta. Pero, ¿a qué costo social y político? Este ya no es un problema de Alfonso Prat Gay. Es, apenas, la pesada herencia que le dejó al gobierno al partir.


Raúl Dellatorre


Raúl Dellatorre: Economista y periodista argentino.

The History of Class Struggle in Vermont: From Socialism to the American Plan

Vermont

The Granai Clan was like many Italian immigrant families settling in Barre at the end of the 19th century. By 1912 Cornelius, one of 18 children, was working as a stone cutter for the Jones Brother Company. His parents were ex-followers of Guiseppe Garibaldi, peasant leader and soldier in the wars of Italian unification.


Decades later, in an interview with a friend, oral historian Roby Colodny, for Vermont’s Untold History, Granai recalled hearing stories about more than a dozen members of one Garibaldi expeditionary force that settled in Barre. Others immigrants called themselves Republicani, followers of Mazzini, elder statesman of the Italian Republic. Whatever their previous affiliations, most considered themselves socialists. And many joined the two main unions for those who cut stone, the Quarry Workers and the Granite Cutters International Association.



Eugene Debs, three-time Socialist candidate for president, visited Barre, as did his successor Norman Thomas in the early 1930s. Fred Suitor, secretary-treasurer of the local Quarry Workers from 1911 to 1930, ran for governor as the Socialist Party candidate in 1912, and was later elected mayor of Barre on the Citizens ticket. According to Granai, everyone knew he was a Socialist.


So much has changed. Barre was Vermont’s third largest city by 1900, right behind Burlington and Rutland. Although a single industry had fueled its growth, no one family or company dominated the local economy or culture. And its population represented a diverse ethnic mix, from French Canadians to immigrants from Italy, Spain and Scotland.


During the historic 1912 strike of textile workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts, organized by the Industrial Workers of the World, at least 200 children of the strikers were sent to the central Vermont city. On February 17, musical bands from Barre, Bethel and Waterbury greeted the kids as they arrived at the train station. They were “divied out” at a crowded Socialist Hall on Granite Street as people sang “son qui” (here I am), the famous duet from Tosca, Puccini’s opera about Italy’s struggle for independence.


Even Yankee farmers from the countryside took children in.


In the 1920s the case of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti captured broad local sympathy, especially in the immigrant neighborhoods. The two self-professed anarchists had been convicted of murder and armed robbery after a controversial trial in which the judge consistently denied defense motions. As new evidence emerged, more people decided that it was a frame-up, part of the red scare that began during the war. Sacco and Vanzetti became a cause célèbre, and attracted worldwide attention and support.


“Barre was never so stirred up,” Granai recalled. “They were seen as victims of their beliefs…victimized by circumstances.” When a play about the two immigrant martyrs was performed at the old Barre Opera House, a thousand tickets were sold for 300 seats. But unlike the Lawrence Strike a decade earlier, there was no victory this time. Sacco and Vanzetti were electrocuted shortly after midnight on August 23, 1927.


The ideas and sympathies of the newcomers sounded “radical” to many of their Yankee neighbors. But their agenda was a campaign for bread and butter, a decent home and education for their children. Like many urban areas in the U.S., Barre witnessed frequent agitation for shorter hours, higher wages and improved working conditions, from “squat sheds” and provocations to lockouts and strikes. Silicosis-producing dust sent many granite workers to the sanitarium on Blakely Hill. Accidents due to drilling and dynamite blasting were common.


A 40-hour workweek, with Saturday afternoon off, was instituted in 1914. Two years later Robert Gordon became Barre’s first Socialist Mayor, winning by 100 votes over the editor of the Barre Daily Times. But the political dynamics were fragile. After war was declared against Germany in 1917 it quickly became a battle against militant labor as well, especially the IWW. Most of its top leadership was rounded up and put on trial. As the Red Scare and deportation of suspected foreign radicals began the city’s socialist movement faded.


A teenager during the war years, John Lawson attended local socialist meetings with his dad. He and his family had reached Barre from Scotland in 1911, and Lawson took it upon himself to revive the Party after the war. It was a lonely task. Most IWW members – called Wobblies – were either in jail or struggling to hold onto union support. Many businesses were tired of dealing with labor demands.





Based on Diego Rivera mural, Rockefeller Center, 1936

By the early 1920s, although the unions were still strong, the socialist movement was in decline and a new slogan was creeping into use – The American Plan. Cloaked in patriotism, the Plan was a business strategy designed to deny recognition, even to well-established unions, and tar almost any demand for better wages or working conditions as “bolshevism.”


“The owners were represented by the Quarry Owners Association and the Barre Granite Association,” Lawson recalled. “Both were backed up by a common Board of Control which sat in Boston.” Through the intransigence of its President James Boutwell, the Board strove to preserve a “united front,” especially during a lockout that ran for months in 1922 and 1923. The Quarry Workers and Granite Cutters held out and some of the smaller companies eventually signed union contracts.


But the “united front” strategy was a partial success. Four months after the strike began scabs were brought in from sheds and quarries in Canada and Massachusetts. Some companies even promised them higher wages than the union was demanding. Once they arrived, however, the wages dropped.


By the time the strike ended, open shop working conditions had taken hold. The Rock of Ages Company was launched soon afterward, a rebranding of the older Boutwell, Milne and Varnum Granite Company, and actively promoted the American Plan. By purchasing other smaller companies – a strategy known as growth-by-acquisition – it became the best-known name in the granite industry. Rock of Ages wasn’t unionized until 1941.


Organizing in Hard Times


IN THE YEARS after World War I, migration to larger Vermont communities accelerated, prompting a building boom in regional centers like Burlington. Milk production was on the rise, although the number of farms was dropping rapidly. Fruit production was also high, at least for a few years, but less butter, hay and other grains were being produced. Both manufacturing and agricultural diversity declined as tourism took a firmer hold on the economy.


At its peak, a trolley system carried over 16 million passengers around Southern Vermont – until the flood of November 1927. But that historic disaster, which hurt rail travel and reduced trolley passengers to less than 2 million, ended up helping the summer home and winter sports sectors of the recreation industry by spurring highway spending and the building of airports. In the early 1930s half of the state’s $12 million annual budget was devoted annually to highway construction. During the same period only $1 million was spent yearly on education and health.
Increased specialization of labor, along with the growth of services industries and transportation systems, drew Vermont more deeply into the national money and credit network. In 1929 that structure collapsed. Unemployment skyrocketed as the standard of living dropped.


In Barre, a two-month strike by granite workers became a “straight out union fight for survival,” recalled Lawson. The strike officially began on April 1, 1933, shutting down six major companies within a week. The only exception was E. L. Smith, which paid above union scale and used workers from Canada. Lawson was president of the Graniteville local, while Granai consulted closely with the strike committee as a lawyer.
The union asked the sheriff and his deputies to let the strikers police themselves. “A police force was established by the wearing of white arm bands,” according to Granai. But at that point agent provocateurs rode in and workers fought back. In some cases the latter brandished shotguns for self-defense. Some strikers were jailed by anti-union judges. The protest was losing ground.


Shortly after the strike began, the sheriff had assisted in the use of 150 strikebreakers. But local residents backed the union, tradesmen and farmers distributed free food, and a federal arbitration board sought a compromise. On April 29, the Quarry Workers union rejected extension of the old contract for a second time. But the Granite Cutters accepted binding arbitration and the strike was almost settled by May 5.


Interpretations of why the National Guard was called in vary. As Granai remembered it, Governor Stanley C. Wilson didn’t issue the order. Rather, people connected with the Granite Cutters made the request “to get rid of agent provocateurs.” Lawson and others recall the situation differently. “Protests against the Guard were lodged by farmers, churchmen, the ACLU, the Vermont federation of labor, and a committee of Barre businessmen,” he insisted.


Whatever the reason, the Guard’s arrival created easier access for strikebreakers. Soon most quarries were back to business as usual. The workers had been demanding union recognition in the open shop quarries, but the presence of the Guard, combined with the action of the Granite Cutters union, left many people high and dry.


Members of both unions returned to work on June 1 and agreed to 1932 wages. But the hearings dragged on until August and many lost their jobs. Two of the three quarries now had open shops. One of the only compensations was that the federal government began to clean up the sheds. Suction machines designed to remove silica dust were in use before the end of the decade


French Canadian workers played a role in this and other strikes, often as scab labor. They had been coming to the state for mill jobs since the Canadian rebellion of 1837, when reformers rejected the political repression of Britain’s parliament. Vermont also provided better farming prospects, and a chance to work in lumbering or on railroad crews. Often called the “Chinese of the Eastern States,” these immigrants worked cheap and asked few questions. But their exploitation as strikebreakers hurt their relations with the Irish.


When mills began to close in the 1930s, many Canadians turned to farming in Franklin, Orleans and Essex Counties at the state’s northern end. Others stayed in the Burlington area but avoided union work. By then the church in Quebec had declared unions atheistic.
History’s long march rarely moves in a straight line.



Epilog: My Socialist Family Ties 

THE ROMANS MAY have been the first rulers to exploit southern Italy, their behavior so brutal that it eventually sparked the revolt of Spartacus. But some believe the darkest period may be the 200-year rule of the Spanish dynasty, which subjected the Mezzogiorno to a long series of predatory feudal barons and viceroys. Officially, feudalism ended in 1806, but its passing also meant that peasants could no longer turn to a wealthy overlord for aid. They were on their own.

Over the next decades, absentee landlords gained in influence, allowing gross inequities and draconian contracts that exploited most peasants. Some became outlaws and thieves. As a result, when southerners resisted landlord abuse or complained to the government, they were called barbarians and savages. But artisans and storekeepers were often respected across class lines. Each trade had its own mastri and apprentices. They were more likely to take advantage of educational opportunities, and also among the earliest to join the exodus to America.

Born on April 17, 1891 in the small Calabrian mountain town of Parenti, Bruno Lupia was the oldest of three brothers and, in 1902, the first of my family to emigrate to the United States. His parents, Michelina Cardamone and Joseph Lupia, had three other children: Lorenzo, Luciano, and Rosa. Lorenzo came to the US a decade later as a teenager, possibly to apprentice with his brother. Luciano followed in 1921. Both of them returned to Italy, however. According to my mother, the former “got into trouble” for his politics and the latter failed in a restaurant business.


There was obviously much more to this story. After all, grandpa Bruno became a clothing manufacturer and philanthropist, influential enough to merit an audience with President Truman.   And Lorenzo ultimately became mayor of his hometown. Not bad for a troublemaker.


Whatever the reasons, evidence suggests that Lorenzo had returned to Calabria by 1919, early enough to fight for Italy in World War I. After the war, he became (or remained) a hard-line Socialist, a “maximalist” who wanted a full-throated social revolution. By 1923, he was criticizing political faddism and the rise of fascism.


“People wake up anarchist in the morning, have a stroll, and become socialist,” he wrote in an article, “at noon comes De Cardona (a political priest), and we all are Popular; in the afternoon, after some drinks, from populist to ’Democratic-Liberal,’ then’fighters’; at night we all dress in black shirts and we are fascist. Without ceremonies!”


Three years later, after a summary trial in November 1926, Lorenzo was “confined” to internal exile. His crime: As secretary of a “dissolved” section of the Socialist Party, he had conducted “active propaganda” throughout the district of Rogliano, defending peasants and challenging fascists. In other words, he was an organizer. But he was also part of the early anti-fascist resistance, and a new decree on public safety, following several attempts to assassinate Mussolini, had increased surveillance, clamped down on dissent, and established a system of “forced residence” (confino).

Once his appeal was dismissed, Lorenzo was sent to Lipari, an island where pigs still cleaned up rubbish in the streets and locals viewed the political prisoners sent there as a pampered “species of nabob.” On the other hand, he also met Carlo Rosselli and Emilio Lussu, democratic organizers and returned soldiers, and Francesco Fausto Nitti, nephew of the deposed prime minister.

When he returned from exile, rather than being intimidated by the time he had spent in prison, Lorenzo continued the struggle for social justice and freedom that characterized his life. As head of the local peasants and laborers organization, he helped to liberate land from the remmaining baronies and fought “agrarian reform” that was being used against peasants and in favor of landowners. He “actively fought fascism with all his might and with the means at his disposal,” one local history noted.
In the first free elections after the fall of the fascist regime, uncle Lorenzo was elected Mayor in 1945, a position he held for the next thirty years, supervising community affairs with rigor, prudence and democratic principles. Unfortunately, due to a political split in the family, we never had the opportunity to meet.


Greg Guma is the Vermont-based author of Dons of Time, Uneasy Empire, Spirits of Desire, Big Lies, and The People’s Republic: Vermont and the Sanders Revolution. He edited Vermont’s Untold History in 1976. 

Fakest News: The Iraq War

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Majority Are Still Falling for Fake News


new poll from YouGov shows that most Americans still believe that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction at the start of the Iraq war:



That’s stunning, given that President Bush, Prime Minister Blairthe CIA, SecDef Rumsfeld, SecState Powell, National Security Advisor Rice, Bush’s chief strategist Rove, “Curveball” (the alias of the name of the unreliable WMD information) and other top officials have all publicly admitted that Iraq had no WMDs.



iraq-wmds


Corporate Media Pushed Fake News


The mainstream media has confessed that they pushed the fake WMD claims.


For example, the New York Times pushed fabricated evidence in the run up to the Iraq war.   A year later, the newspaper apologized for its inaccurate, one-sided coverage.


The Washington Post also apologized for hyping the non-existent WMD threat.


CNN’s Howard Kurtz wrote:



Major news organizations aided and abetted the Bush administration’s march to war on what turned out to be faulty premises. All too often, skepticism was checked at the door, and the shaky claims of top officials and unnamed sources were trumpeted as fact.


***


The low level of public confidence in the media has many causes, but one of them stems from what happened back in 2003.



Government Officials Pushed Fake News


We in the alternative media have reported over and over and over and over and over and over that all of the insiders knew that Iraq didn’t have weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). And see this.


Catastrophic Consequences of Fake News


We were told that the Iraq war would make us safer.  We were told that it would be quick, and would virtually pay for itself. (We were also told that it would be a “cakewalk”, and that American soldiers would be greeted with flowers.)


In reality, the Iraq war was a total disaster.


The war cost up to $6 trillion dollars, which – even in a country as big as the U.S. – is a lot of money.


The war made us less secure than before.  Remember, Al Qaeda wasn’t even in Iraq until the U.S. invaded that country. And the Iraq war directly led to the creation of ISIS.


Indeed, the leaders of America and the UK were warned that the Iraq war would increase terrorism … before they pulled the trigger.


That’s “fake news” …

Recount for President: No Change, but Holes Exposed in Voting Systems

Computer scientists J. Alex Halderman and Matt Bernhard, both faculty members at the University of Michigan, spoke about the U.S. elections at the recent Chaos Communication Convention in Hamburg, Germany. Based on the ballots in their limited recounts, they found no evidence that the election was hacked. But they emphasized that finding no evidence of hacking is not the same as finding solid affirmation that the election wasn’t hacked. That"s because only some of the ballots had a paper trail that could be recounted.


Halderman, Bernhard, and others including writers for The New American have previously expressed concerns about the vulnerability of paperless voting equipment to enable someone with read-write access to the database of vote totals to alter the numbers unnoticed. But Halderman and Bernhard expressed even further concerns about the centralization of the preparation of the voting equipment prior to elections. An article covering the event in The Guardian quoted Halderman:


In Michigan, for example, 75% of counties use just two companies, each around 20 employees large, to load their machines. Compromising those two companies would theoretically be enough to swing the vote in the state. “How central these points of attack are, that was news to me,” Halderman said.





Halderman made national headlines in 2010 when he led a team of his students as they white-hat hacked an Internet voting system that was made available to the public for testing. This event was covered by The New American, which quoted Halderman as saying:


It was extremely easy. Within the first three hours or so of looking at the code we found the first open door and within 36 hours we had taken control of the system.


After penetrating the system, Halderman and his team modified ballots, changed passwords, and directed the system to play the University of Michigan"s fight song. They also discovered that other hackers from Iran and China were trying to do some of the same things.


Halderman and other experts say the breach highlights flaws in online voting that cannot be fixed at present.


The New American print issue for October 9, 2000 included an article entitled "Voting on the Web," which exposed some of the dangers of Internet voting and mentioned how individuals had attempted to hack that year’s Arizona Democratic primary using denial of service attacks and password guessing. This raises an interesting question: Why the sudden interest in only Russian hackers, when such hacking attempts have been known for years, and previous reports concerning the problem by The New American and other news sources have been largely ignored?


There are other vulnerabilities in our elections besides lacking a paper trail in the equipment. Elections can be stolen by people voting several times under different names. They can also be swung by lax enforcement of voter registration laws allowing non-citizens — even illegal aliens — to vote. The New American has also reported on a recently discovered vulnerability of using computer programs such as Fraction Magic to alter vote totals and subtotals when there is no publicly verified paper trail of precinct totals.


Fortunately, American elections can be saved. It will take educating the voters on how to verify elections, as well as implementing audit procedures similar to the Targeted Audit Recount (TAR), which recounts the voter-verified paper ballots, allows losing candidates to pick the precincts to be audited, and has a mechanism for verifying who voted and whether they were eligible.


Our elections can also be improved by getting the federal government out of the process. That would include repealing such laws as Motor Voter and the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), for starters.


Photo, taken during a presidential election recount in Michigan, of a ballot with a vote for Trump: AP Images


Related articles:


Hacked E-Voting E-Nightmare

2016 Strikes Again: America’s Oldest African Lion Euthanized at Zoo for Being Too Old & Inactive


Philadelphia, PA — (RT) As if our favorite movie and music stars weren’t enough, 2016 has managed to cram another death into its busy schedule – that of America’s oldest African lion, 25-year-old Zenda, who was euthanized in the Philadelphia Zoo.




“Philadelphia Zoo announced today that Zenda, a 25-year-old female African lion, was euthanized on Thursday, December 29th due to an acute decline in her mobility and behavior,” the Philadelphia Zoo said in a statement.



Zenda was the oldest African lion in captivity in the US, the zoo’s statement said, adding that she had exceeded “the 17-year typical life expectancy for lions in zoos.”



“This remarkable cat will be missed by staff and guests alike, particularly by the keepers who catered to her changing needs as she grew old,” said Dr. Andy Baker, Chief Operating Officer at the Philadelphia Zoo.



Zenda was born in 1991 at the Johannesburg Zoo in South Africa and she arrived at the Philadelphia Zoo in 1993 at the age of 2.



“During her many years in Philadelphia, Zenda was one of the Zoo’s most loved and most popular animals,” the zoo said.



Zenda played a major role in the zoo’s innovations and took part in the opening of the Big Cat Falls exhibit in 2006.



“Despite their already advancing age, Zenda and her pridemates were eager explorers of the habitat time-share system allowed by the design of Big Cat Falls when we opened it in 2006. Their engagement was one of the inspirations for our pioneering Zoo-wide trail system concept,” Baker added.




People turned to social media to mourn the death of the beloved lioness, writing posts saying “RIP Zenda,”“Thanks for all the fun times,” and “She never knew freedom. I hope she has it now.”


Others took the opportunity to once again slam “deadly 2016,” a year which took away many celebrities, including Carrie Fisher, George Michael, David Bowie, Muhammad Ali, Prince, Alan Rickman, and Leonard Cohen. And, in a last gasp, 2016 took Zenda the lioness from them as well, twitterites said.


“2016 strikes again. RIP Zenda,”“No one was safe in 2016, not even Zenda, the oldest African lion in US,” “2016 claims another,” they tweeted.


Multiple Miami Cops Fired for Saying they Use Black Neighborhoods as a Shooting Range


Miami, FL — (RT) Three rookie police officers were fired just before days Christmas after joking in chat logs about using Miami’s black neighborhoods as a shooting range, according to an internal investigation.



“Anyone know of an indoor shooting range in Miami?” one officer asked in a WhatsApp group chat, according to a story first reported by the Miami Herald.


“Go to model city they have moving targets,” replied Kevin Bergnes.


“There’s a range in overtown on 1 and 11. Moving targets and they don’t charge,” added Miguel Valdes.



Overtown is the name of a predominant black neighborhood, just northwest of downtown Miami. It was originally called Colored Town during the Jim Crow era of the late 19th through the mid-20th century.


Officers Bergnes, Valdes and Bruce Alcin told an investigator they were “joking,” according to investigation documents, obtained by the Miami Herald.


But the social media chat upset a colleague and the three officers were fired two days before Christmas.


Stephen Lopez, an attorney for the officers, said the remarks were taken out of context and that there was no misconduct.


Lopez told the Miami Herald his clients were not racist as Alcin is African American, and Valdes has a black grandfather.


He said that the officers plan to sue the city because it discriminated against them.
It is not the first time that Miami police officers have been embroiled in a racial profiling scandal.



In January 2015, a National Guard Sergeant paid a visit to a shooting range in Medley, Florida and found North Miami Beach Police had been doing shooting drills using mug shots of six black males as targets.



To make matters worse, Valerie Deant recognized one of the images as her brother, Woody.


About 15 years earlier, Woody Deant had been arrested over his involvement in a drag racing incident that left two people dead. Deant, whose image at the firing range had been sprayed by bullets, had spent four years behind bars.


North Miami Beach Police Chief J. Scott Dennis defended the actions of his officers, some of whom he said are minorities themselves. Dennis said his department also uses images of whites and Latinos for target practice.


“Our policies were not violated,” the police chief was quoted by NPR as saying. “There is no discipline forthcoming for the individuals who were involved with this.”


He admitted, however, that the officers could have exercised better judgment, because one of the men, Woody Deant, “would be someone that was on the streets of North Miami Beach.”


Two years prior in April 2013, a Florida policeman lost his job for using photos of Trayvon Martin, the young black man who was shot and killed last year by a neighborhood watchman, for target practice.


Warning to Trump: don’t approve GMO, pesticide, FDA horror show

Warning to Trump: don’t approve GMO, pesticide, FDA horror show


You are incompetent on these vital subjects


Don’t plunge ahead


Stop thinking about jobs, jobs, jobs for two seconds


By Jon Rappoport


In a previous article on Donald Trump, I wrote: “I think Trump favors jobs, all jobs, and will go to extremes to create them…He’ll find ways to allow the FDA to license new drugs more quickly, thus maiming and killing more Americans. He’ll cast a blind eye toward big corporate toxic GMOs/pesticides.”


I want to strengthen that warning.


First of all, the FDA isn’t being too careful in their drug approval process, as Trump team members suggest. It’s the opposite. The FDA is in the pocket of pharmaceutical companies. The president-elect should take notice of the famous July 26, 2000, review in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by Dr. Barbara Starfield, a revered public-health expert at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.


Starfield concluded that FDA-approved medical drugs kill 106,000 Americans a year. That would be 1.06 MILLION deaths per decade. Speeding up their drug-approval work now, the FDA would add many MORE dead Americans to their “credit.”


On the issue of GMO/pesticide safety, I could cite many references which eradicate the official claim that these substances are safe. But let’s look at the primary facts surrounding the original approval of GMO crops (and their attendant pesticides) in the US.


When you cut through the verbiage, you arrive at two key statements. One from Monsanto and one from the FDA, the agency responsible for overseeing, licensing, and certifying new food varieties as safe.


Quoted in the New York Times Magazine (October 25, 1998, “Playing God in the Garden”), Philip Angell, Monsanto’s director of corporate communications, famously stated:


“Monsanto shouldn’t have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA’s job.”


From the Federal Register, Volume 57, No.104, “Statement of [FDA] Policy: Foods Derived from New Plant Varieties,” here is what the FDA had to say on this matter: “Ultimately, it is the food producer who is responsible for assuring safety.”


This buck-passing, the direct and irreconcilable clash of these two statements, is no accident. It’s not a sign of incompetence or sloppy work or a mistake or a miscommunication. It’s a clear signal the fix was in.


There was no science to back up the claim that GMOs were safe.


My belief, at the moment, is that Trump will screw all this up completely. His focus on jobs and the economy will lead him into doing grave damage—just as Obama has, just as Hillary Clinton would have.


The corporate media, their corporate experts and allies, and their government friends have low-keyed the whole GMO-pesticide-FDA horror show for a long time.


We need a president who will go against the tide.


On these issues, Mr. Trump, through ignorance, inattention, unconcern, whatever, is on the verge of becoming a Big Pharma Big Biotech shill.







Threat to Academic Freedom: Censored Professor Civil Rights Lawsuit Against Florida Atlantic University

james-tracy

Former FAU Professor James Tracy, who was terminated from his tenured faculty position in January 2016 in retaliation for his personal blogging, has amended his federal lawsuit following a federal court ruling dismissing part of his lawsuit, including his due process claims and state law claims against FAU faculty union representatives.


Professor Tracy’s amended complaint now consists of only five federal counts against the Defendant University and one count for breach of contract. Two of Professor Tracy’s remaining federal counts under Section 1983 are also levied against three senior FAU officials, in their personal capacities, including FAU’s President John Kelly, Vice Provost Diane Alperin, and Dean Heather Coltman. One count for conspiracy to interfere with Professor Tracy’s civil rights remains against the Defendants United Faculty of Florida (“UFF”) and Florida Education Association (“FEA”), and Professor Tracy’s faculty union representatives, UFF-FAU President Robert Zoeller, Jr. and UFF/FEA Service Unit Director Michael Moats.



The amended lawsuit adds several new exhibits, including e-mail communications and internal notes recorded by senior FAU officials and representatives, showing the conspiracy to violate Professor Tracy’s civil rights. It can be viewed here.


Dr. James Tracy is an award-winning American academic with expertise in communications, media and conspiracy studies, who was awarded lifetime tenure by Florida Atlantic University in 2008. He holds a Ph.D. in mass communications and taught courses at FAU in Communications, including a course entitled Culture of Conspiracy.


The lawsuit seeks Tracy’s reinstatement other forms of equitable and monetary relief.


Inquiries may be directed to [email protected].

Why Netanyahu Is Upset About UN Security Council Resolution 2334: The Total Illegality of Israel’s Settlements

Netanyahu

Members of the world community finally reached a limit witnessing Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. The United Nations Security Council presented a peace offering to Palestinians days before the official birthday of Jesus in what is now occupied Bethlehem: resolution 2334, with a “vision of a region where two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, live side by side in peace within secure and recognized borders.” Ironically, the seemingly toothless resolution’s main notoriety comes from Netanyahu’s fury at its passage.


The resolution, which aims to bring a lasting peace to Israelis and Palestinians based on international law, comes at a time when Israel seemed to be in the “mop-up” phase of its theft of Palestinian resources (such as water and gas) and its annexation of whatever it wanted of the Palestinian territories it has occupied since 1967: East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza.


The media censorship of Israel’s brutality towards the Palestinians has made their horrific situation virtually invisible to the western public, allowing Israel to ignore — besides basic human decency — virtually all international laws protecting Palestinian human, civil and property rights.  Israel has been ethnicly cleansing East Jerusalem, which it is trying to annex; it is maintaining apartheid in the occupied West Bank according to the 2012 Russell Tribunal, and committing genocide against Gazans according to the 2013 Kuala Lumpur tribunal.  Despite such findings, Israel’s allies are attempting to criminalize speech critical of Israel or advocating redress.


What the resolution calls for


Resolution 2334 lays out the Security Council’s intention to start diplomatic meetings to create a lasting peace based on “the relevant United Nations’ resolutions, and other peace agreements and initiatives”, along with periodic follow-up reports.  More specifically, resolution 2334 calls for:


Israel to “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem” because of their illegality;


  the international community to recognize the difference “in its dealings” between Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories;



immediate steps to prevent all violence against civilians, including acts of terror, as well as acts of provocation and destruction;


calls for accountability in this regard,


both parties to act on the basis of international law, including international humanitarian law… ; and


 efforts aimed at achieving, without delay a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East on the basis of the relevant United Nations resolutions, and … an end to the Israeli occupation.



Implications


The resolution confirms the total illegality of Israel’s settlements; the wording “completely cease all settlement activities” might also be interpreted to mean the dismantling of the settlements.


If Israel refuses to abide by the resolution’s call to end all settlement activity, the Palestinians can pursue cases against Israeli leaders at the International Criminal Court.


By calling for the international community to differentiate between Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories “in its dealings“, the UN is calling for an end to trade agreements(such as Canada’s) that support the financial viability of the settlements by allowing Israel to mislabel products produced in the settlements as from “Israel” in order to facilitate sales and avoid duties.


The call to prevent all violence against civilians, including acts of terror … provocation and destruction”, is a stunning rebuke of Israeli violence against Palestinian civilians and the destruction of their homes and properties. The currently-used definition of terrorism*, which excludes state terrorism (and thus actions by Israel or Hamas) includes the actions of Jewish settlers, the major source of terrorism in Israel.


The call for accountability is a call for an end to Israel’s impunity for crimes including its massive attacks on Gaza as well as its almost daily attacks on Palestinian farmers, fishermen and other civilians.


The call for “both parties” to “act on the basis of …. international humanitarian law” is a demand that Israel, as the Occupying Power, respect the Fourth Geneva Convention, the law governing the treatment of civilians under military occupation.  Israel’s obligations are not only to protect the welfare of those civilians, but to refrain from moving its population into occupied territory or retaining the territory under any circumstances.


The resolution calls for efforts to end Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory, which Israel would find costly. Its confinement of millions of Palestinians is hugely profitable, largely because the world community has assumed Israel’s legal obligation to provide for their food, education and other humanitarian needs.  Israel skims off humanitarian aid money and forces funds to be converted into the shekel, propping up its currency. Palestinians are used as cheap and disposal labor in Israel’s industrial zones and as guinea pigs for its weapons testing.  The West Bank, from which Israel gets much of its water and farm land, is used for Israel’s toxic dumps.


This resolution’s intent to follow up on final status peace negotiations is a major problem for Israel because the next world conference on Israel/ Palestine is on January 15th, when President Obama is still in office.  If a resolution is passed that sets parameters such as the issue of Israel’s borders, the status of Jerusalem and the Palestinian right of return, along with a time-limit for the negotiations, it would be almost impossible for Donald Trump to intervene.  Trump would have to get the support of at least nine countries in the Security Council  behind a new resolution that would overturn the offending resolution — and then ensure that the permanent members, including Russia and China, would not veto it.


Conclusion


Israel’s violations of UN SC Resolution 2334 — which calls for an end to the settlements, steps to prevent acts of violence against civilians, and for accountability — justify boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, particularly of products from Israel’s settlements.


Israel’s ongoing violations should also end the current efforts to criminalize speech critical of Israel.  People of conscience can not be said to be guilty of “racism”, “anti-Semitism”, or “hate speech” when they describe Israel’s defiance of this resolution and of international laws — or advocate economic responses to facilitate a just peace.


Hopes for an ending to the Palestinian plight now hinge on the passage of a follow-up resolution at the January 15th conference that will call for final status negotiations on Israel’s borders, the status of Jerusalem and the Palestinian right of return — with set time limits.


The United Nations SC resolution 2334 demonstrates that the world body retains its credibility in calling for justice.


The UN has been responsible for the Palestinian tragedy; members must now take responsibility for ending it.


The definition of “terrorism” presumably the one used by the annual Global Index of Terrorism:



The Global Terrorism Index uses data supported by the Department of Homeland Security which includes incidents meeting the following criteria:


1. The incident must be intentional – the result of a conscious calculation on the part of a perpetrator.


2. The incident must entail some level of violence or threat of violence — including property violence, as well as violence against people


3. The perpetrators of the incidents must be sub-national actors. This database does not include acts of state terrorism. In addition to this baseline definition, two of the following three criteria have to be met in order to be included in the START database from 1997: ….The violent act was aimed at attaining a political, economic, religious, or social goal. ….The violent act included evidence of an intention to coerce, intimidate, or convey some other message to a larger audience (or audiences) other than the immediate victims. ….The violent act was outside the precepts of international humanitarian law. (Vision of Humanity)



from:

How Obama Overrode Kerry’s Agreements with Russia

russia-usa

On more than one occasion, U.S. President Barack Obama overrode agreements that his Secretary of State John Kerry had reached with Russia. Unlike Obama’s consistent support of his prior Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton’s, initiatives (such as her backing of the coup that on 28 June 2009 had overthrown the progressive democratically elected President of Honduras and replaced him with a fascist regime), Secretary of State Kerry has repeatedly suffered humiliations from his boss’s (Obama’s) reversals of agreements that Kerry had reached with Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.


The latest such incident was headlined at the «Moon of Alabama» blog on December 21st, “How The Military Excluded The White House From International Syria Negotiations», where the anonymous blogger arbitrarily blamed «the military» (instead of Kerry’s boss, Obama) for having sabotaged «the White House» (instead of sabotaged the Kerry-Lavrov agreement) — the agreement that Secretary of State Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had reached on 17 May 2016 for a «comprehensive ceasefire» between the U.S. and Russia regarding Syria (and which the White House then sabotaged).



Obama never condemned nor fired any general, nor anyone else, for having perpetrated the U.S. bombing of Syrian government forces at Deir Zor, on 17 September 2016 — the sabotaging-event, which naturally caused Putin to instruct Lavrov to terminate all discussions with Kerry, because it displayed Obama’s unwavering determination to defeat Russia. (That sabotaging-event then motivated the meeting, on December 20th, when Russia, Turkey, and Iran, met together and agreed in their joint «Moscow Declaration», to complete, on their own, their war against the West’s jihadists who were trying to overthrow Assad; and so, the jihadists in Aleppo simply surrendered to Assad’s government — and the U.S. government and its propaganda ‘press’ howled that this was a victory for the ‘brutal’ Assad against ‘the civilians’, and against ‘the rebels’ — the latter being actually the U.S.-Saudi-Qatari-backed jihadists.)


Kerry had failed because Obama wanted a military settlement of the U.S.-backed jihadist invasion of Syria; he didn’t want a diplomatic end to it — at least not a diplomatic end that wasn’t a surrender by the Syrian government forces: the replacement of Assad by the jihadists (who were backed not only by Obama, but by King Saud who owns Saudi Arabia, and by Emir Thani who owns Qatar).


And this sabotage, by Obama, actually repeated Obama’s earlier refusal to accept the deal that Kerry had negotiated with Lavrov to settle the conflict in Ukraine. As I had headlined on 7 June 2015, «Obama Sidelines Kerry on Ukraine Policy». Kerry had told the U.S.-installed regime in Ukraine to cease promising to conquer the two breakaway regions that had refused to accept rule by America’s puppets after Obama’s coup overthrew the democratically elected Ukrainian President, for whom both of those regions, Crimea and Donbass, had overwhelmingly voted. Crimea rejoined Russia, of which it had been a part for hundreds of years before the Soviet dictator had transferred it to Ukraine in 1954, but on 17 September 2014 Putin declined the urgings of Donbass to become a part of Russia, and so Donbass became instead an independent country, for the time being.


Though Kerry told Obama’s puppet-President of Ukraine to adhere to the Minsk agreements, Kerry’s nominal subordinate, Hillary Clinton’s friend Victoria Nuland, told this puppet to ignore Kerry’s statement, and Obama backed Nuland against her nominal superior, Kerry. If Kerry had been working under a decent President, he would have been a great Secretary of State, and Kerry cannot reasonably be blamed for his misfortune — and the world’s — that his ‘superior’ (the U.S. President under whom he served) was Obama.

Syria, Russia and American Desperation

U.S.-Russia-Syria

Legions of people will protest Donald Trump’s inauguration. The Democratic rank and file “are anxious about racism, immigration, Islamophobia, judicial appointees and voter suppression,” but their leaders have a different agenda.


War Democrats and Republicans care only about maintaining imperialism — through lies and repression. The bipartisan War Party is desperate to continue its regime change policies and foil improved relations with Russia.



Blaming Russia continues the propaganda war against a country that will not knuckle under and accept American hegemony.



It is no coincidence that anti-Russian propaganda is being ramped up at the same moment the Syrian government is poised to retake its country from terrorists. Barack Obama and the rest of the war party are left to sputter nonsensical statements because their grand plan to realize the neocon Project for a New American Century is in very big trouble.



The American corporate media ignored the suffering of Syrians in the city of Aleppo until their captivity was broken by the Syrian Arab Army. Ever since 2012 ISIS and other terrorist groups sponsored by the United States, NATO, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar have held thousands of people hostage there. Turks picked the region apart, raiding Syrian factories and transporting them piece by piece back to their country.


Now that the Syrians are retaking the city with the help of their Russian and Hezbollah allies, there is a steady stream of news about the Aleppo. All of it is meant to pull at the heart strings of uninformed people as the human rights industrial complex reliably goes about its dirty work. Human Rights Watch and other groups who work to promote United States foreign policy speak endlessly about war crimes. They didn’t say much when America’s allies were terrorizing Syrians but now they suddenly point fingers and always at the people who run afoul of regime change plans.



The human rights industrial complex reliably goes about its dirty work.



The five year-long effort to destroy the Syrian state has produced many victims in that country and it always threatened to spark a larger international conflict. The assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey could be such a moment. The gunman’s last words and obviously his actions were a call to jihad. Even one hundred years later the 1914 assassination in Sarajevo is not far from memory.


But the United States is the principal actor in this drama. None of the other nations involved in this crime would have acted absent American direction. All of the casualties, the sieges, the hunger and the frantic search for refuge can be placed at America’s feet. So too the death of the Russian ambassador. This international tangle is covered with American finger prints.


The Syrian government is determined to take back its country and the Americans and their allies are equally determined to thwart it. The recent successes of the Syrian army explain part of the desperation coming from Obama, the Democratic Party and corporate media. Blaming Russia kills several birds with one stone. It continues the propaganda war against a country that will not knuckle under and accept American hegemony. The hyper Russophobia was also an attempt to make the unpalatable and incompetent Hillary Clinton more appealing. And its continuation is being used by Democrats and Republicans to stop the incoming president from having any chance to improve relations with that country or curtail the regime change doctrine. The war party never sleeps.


Barack Obama’s last press conference was replete with lies and insults aimed at Russia and Vladimir Putin. He should have been embarrassed to say that Russia was “smaller,” “weaker” and “doesn’t produce anything that anybody wants to buy except oil and gas and arms.” He completed his bizarre rant by saying that Putin was “the former head of the KGB.” He was no such thing and of course Obama knows that. It isn’t clear if he expected anyone to believe him or if facing his failure carried him away to heights of rhetorical foolishness.



All of the casualties, the sieges, the hunger and the frantic search for refuge can be placed at America’s feet.



Obama thought that Hillary Clinton would win and complete his regime change plans. Not only did she lose and deprive him of his third term but the hollowness of his legacy is clear. Obviously “hope and change” was a marketing tag line meant to hide his commitment to the world wide neoliberal project.


Donald Trump will be president of the United States in just four weeks. That is a short period of time in which to pull off a soft coup. He will be inaugurated but team Obama want to make sure he cannot upend the status quo they work so hard to uphold.


While the Democratic Party rank and file are anxious about racism, immigration, Islamophobia, judicial appointees and voter suppression their leaders only care about maintaining imperialism. Obama and the rest of the democratic party are unworthy of the loyalty they engender. On January 20th thousands of people will head to Washington to protest Trump while the Democrats will be making last ditch efforts to help jihadists destroy Syria.


Some of the protesters ought to target their ire at Obama and the Democrats and not just because of their electoral failure. They ought to pledge an end to support for warmongering Democrats altogether. If it is true that Trump is a fascist he won’t be the first one in the White House. His predecessor fits that description just as well. But events may have spun out of his control. The fate of Syria may not be in American hands any longer. And that is why the desperation is so evident.


Margaret Kimberley’s Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com.

Todo lo que hay que saber sobre las últimas sanciones de Obama a la diplomacia rusa

russia-hacking-group

Nota del Editor: El Centro de Investigación sobre la Globalización (Global Research) reproduce los aspectos clave de la actualización de la imposiciones de sanciones económicas impuestas a Moscú de parte del Gobierno de Barack Obama, publicados por la cadena RT en Español.


La Oficina de Prensa de la Casa Blanca anunció este jueves la decisión del presidente Barack Obama de emitir sanciones a una serie de personas y organismos que estarían supuestamente implicados en llevar a cabo ciberataques para influir en las elecciones presidenciales estadounidenses:


  • Dos agencias de inteligencia rusas, el Servicio Federal de Seguridad (FSB) y el Departamento Central de Inteligencia (GRU).

  • Cuatro funcionarios del GRU.

  • Tres empresas rusas “que suministraron apoyo material a las operaciones cibernéticas del GRU”.

  • 35 diplomáticos rusos, que han sido declarados ‘persona non grata’ y deben abandonar el país en 72 horas.

  • Dos supuestos complejos de inteligencia rusos —en Maryland y Nueva York—,que se habrían utilizado para el ciberespionaje a favor del FSB y el GRU, han sido cerrados.

Las reacciones a la decisión de EE.UU. 


Rusia respondió a la decisión del presidente estadounidense a través de los representantes oficiales de su diplomacia:


La Embajada de Rusia en Londres (Reino Unido) a través de su cuenta de Twitter llamó a esta decisión del presidente Obama como “un ‘déjà vu’ de la Guerra Fría” , asegurando que “todos, incluido el pueblo estadounidense, estaremos encantados de ver lo último de esta desafortunada Administración”.


  • María Zajárova, portavoz de la Cancillería rusa, dedicó unas duras líneas a la Administración de Obama a través de las redes sociales. “Los inquilinos de la Casa Blanca durante estos 8 años no son una Administración, sino un grupo de perdedores en política exterior, resentidos y mediocres. En el día de hoy, Obama lo ha reconocido oficialmente”, publicó la funcionaria en su cuenta de Facebook. Aseguró que “el premio Nobel se las ingenió para poner una mancha mugrienta en vez de un punto final elegante”, a su mandato.

  • Dmitri Medvédev, primer ministro de Rusia, publicó en su cuenta de Twitter que “es triste que la Administración de Obama, que empezó su mandato restableciendo la cooperación [con Rusia], termine con una agonía antirrusa. D.E.P.”.

  • Serguéi Lavrov, ministro de Exteriores ruso, propuso al presidente Vladímir Putin declarar ‘persona non grata’ a 31 diplomáticos de la embajada estadounidense en Moscú y a 4 empleados del consulado de San Petersburgo. ” No podemos dejar estas tretas sin respuesta. La reciprocidad es la ley de la diplomacia y de las relaciones internacionales”, aseguró Lavrov.

Asimismo, Kellyanne Conway, consejera del presidente electo de EE.UU., aseguró que las nuevas sanciones contra Rusia podrían ir destinadas a “arrinconar” a Trump. “Las transiciones pacíficas no funcionan así en esta democracia”, lamentó Conway, que aseguró que “todo lo que hemos estado oyendo durante las elecciones fue: ‘Rusia, Rusia, Rusia’”. 


La decisión del presidente ruso 


Vladímir Putin dio a conocer su decisión respecto al tema. En declaraciones brindadas este viernes, aseguró: “no vamos a rebajarnos a una diplomacia ‘de cocina’ e irresponsable” y añadió que “las acciones de EE.UU. no solo afectan a nuestras relaciones bilaterales, sino al mundo entero”.


Aseguró que Rusia no va a expulsar a ningún diplomático estadounidense. “No vamos a expulsar a nadie. No vamos a prohibir a sus familiares e hijos que vayan a sus lugares favoritos para descansar en estas fiestas de fin de año”, declaró el presidente, que incluso invitó a los hijos de los diplomáticos acreditados en Rusia a celebrar las fiestas en la ceremonia especial que se celebra todos los años en el Kremlin.


El presidente ruso Vladímir Putin y su homólogo estadounidense Barack Obama comparten un brindis durante la Asamblea General de la ONU. 28 de septiembre de 2015.Mikhail Metzel/RIA NovostiReuters
Finalmente, lamentó que la Administración de Obama “concluya de esta forma su mandato”, pero deseó un feliz año al presidente estadounidense y a toda su familia, al igual que a su sucesor en el cargo, Donald Trump, con quien asegura que trabajará para restablecer las relaciones ruso-estadounidenses en el futuro próximo.


El fondo de la acusación


En octubre pasado, la CIA presentó un informe en el que acusaba a Rusia de intervenir con ayuda de piratas informáticos en las elecciones presidenciales del país norteamericano, una supuesta ayuda que permitió al candidato republicano Donald Trump obtener la victoria. La CIA aseguró que fueron ‘hackers’ rusos los que vulneraron las cuentas de correo electrónico de varios miembros del Partido Demócrata y del Republicano.


La información que los piratas informáticos obtuvieron tras vulnerar los correos del Partido Demócrata estadounidense fue publicada por WikiLeaks, cuyo fundador ha negado en diversas ocasiones que la fuente de la filtración fuera Rusia.


Estos correos sacaron a la luz asuntos como las maniobras de varios miembros del Partido Demócrata para favorecer la candidatura de Clinton en las primarias en detrimento de Bernie Sanders [lo que llevó a la renuncia de la presidenta Nacional del Comité Demócrata, Debbie Wasserman], las conexiones del partido con importantes agentes de Wall Street o las donaciones de varios países extranjeros a la campaña demócrata.


Al respecto de estas acusaciones, el presidente Putin ha negado reiteradamente que su Gobierno estuviera detrás del robo informático, pero destacó durante su rueda de prensa anual que el fondo de toda esta polémica era desviar la atención sobre el verdadero problema que salió a la luz: “¿La jefa del Comité Nacional Demócrata renunció tras la publicación de lo que descubrieron los ‘hackers’? ¡Entonces los ‘hackers’ dijeron la verdad!”. 


Russia Today

Is There Such A Thing As ‘Natural Law’?

Off The Grid Theology

Is There Such A Thing As ‘Natural Law’?

Image source: Weisspaarz.com / Creative Commons



If you want my thesis of natural law theory in one graphic sentence, I will provide it: the most consistent defender of natural law theory was the Marquis de Sade. 


                    — Gary North, Westminster’s Confession (1991)


 


 The Fear Of The LORD Is . . .


Let’s talk about the right place to begin a discussion of natural law. What’s important to establish early on is that these rules are determined by the God who creates, who speaks and who decrees the end from the beginning.  The God who is Triune. The God who reveals Himself in Jesus Christ. The God who speaks infallibly in Scripture. The God who saves sinners through Jesus’ blood.


This God, and no other, is the only foundation for all intelligible thought, communication, and learning.  That said, this is what Scripture explicitly teaches about where to start: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge” (Prov. 1:7).  Again, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding” (Prov. 9:10).


Unless the God who created the world tells us about Himself and creation, unless He opens our hearts to hear and believe that truth … we are left with foolishness and its attendant skepticism — cynicism and nihilism. There’s nothing we can truly know and we can be sure of nothing truly.  For that matter, we can’t even be sure there is something to be sure about.


Christian Heroes For Christian Kids: These Amazing Stories Are Putting God Back Into History!


Is There Such A Thing As ‘Natural Law’?

Image source: Pixabay.com



But the question of knowing something is only part of the discussion.  That’s because in Scripture, to know God and to fear God mean also to obey God.  Epistemology (study of knowledge) and ethics (rules for living) are rarely separate concepts in the Bible, but rather, are woven tightly together throughout Scripture:



Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding (Job 28:28).


The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth forever (Ps. 111:10).


Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD, that delighteth greatly in his commandments (Ps. 112:1).


Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man (Eccl. 12:13).



God’s commandments are revealed in Scripture.  Knowledge and wisdom are inextricably “interwoven” with obedience to those commandments.  What’s more… these commandments, the laws revealed in Scripture… are alone authoritative and infallible.



“To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them” (Isa. 8:20).



Biblical epistemology drives us necessarily to biblical law.


Total Depravity And Natural Law


But doesn’t Scripture allow for a divine law implicit in Nature, one accessible to unaided reason?  In my previous articles on epistemology, I’ve talked about general revelation, the revelation that exists in creation and in the hearts of men (Ps. 19:1-6; Rom. 1:18-20).  I’ve also tried to establish that the Apostle Paul argues that even the heathen have “the work of the law written in their hearts” and that they are, therefore, responsible for their actions (Rom. 2:14-15).


Is There Such A Thing As ‘Natural Law’?Certainly, Paul teaches us that general revelation is so clear that it leaves men without excuse for their sins (Rom. 1:20).  And He definitely declares that “the work of the law” is written in the hearts of those who have never heard the Gospel.  In fact, He goes on to emphasize the human conscience as being a very accurate testimony to man’s true moral nature. His conclusion? Unbelievers have a conscience, with concepts of right and wrong.  What Paul doesn’t say, though, is that this vague “conscience” is a substitute for the commandments of God revealed in Scripture.


Here’s the problem: The natural man’s conscience is sufficient to condemn him because he can’t and doesn’t live up to his own imperfect standard.  That’s because the natural man’s moral nature is thoroughly defiled and corrupt.  The Bible says his heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked (Jer. 17:9).  The ways that seem right to him are the ways of death (Prov. 14:12).  Though he holds the truth, he suppresses it in unrighteousness (Rom. 1:18).  And until and unless he is born again, he will not come to the light lest that light should condemn his works (John 3:20).  In short, the man outside of Christ hates God’s commandments precisely because they are God’s commandments:



Because the carnal mind is enmity against God:  for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be (Rom. 8:7).



The truth is, the natural man wants nothing to do with what God commands.  Our current 24-hour news cycle as well as all recorded history bears witness to this.  When we look at the news or the law codes of the nations both ancient and modern, we do see echoes of biblical morality, particularly in the legal codes of the once Christian West, where the influence of Scripture has been strongest.  But none of these codes are consistent with what our Creator requires of us.


And many of the things that we find in these law codes are profoundly at odds with one another.  Further, much of what we find there is reprehensible and abominable.  We find polygamy, chattel slavery, pederasty, infanticide, and abortion enshrined and codified as integral parts of the cultures of whole peoples, nations, and empires.


Worse still, we know from Scripture that every sin, every moral perversity imaginable, has at some time or other been elevated by fallen man to the role of virtue or religious service (Deut. 12:31).  The ancient Canaanites practiced prostitution, self-mutilation, and child sacrifice in their worship of Baal.  The Thuggee of India strangled thousands of travelers in the name of the goddess Kali.  And the Sawi tribe of Netherlands New Guinea embraced any kind of treachery (including cannibalism) as the greatest of virtues and the highest good. (When missionaries first presented the Gospel story to this New Guinea tribe, they actually mistook Judas as the hero because of his great betrayal.)


What Does Natural Law Actually Say?


In the light of all of this, we shouldn’t be surprised that no one has ever published a written testimony or transcript of natural law.  Even though adherents have said for centuries that’s it’s supposed to be accessible to all thoughtful and rational men… no one has ever written down what’s actually accessible or even a summary of its principles.


But if anyone ever makes the attempt, here are some questions he should answer along the way:


  • Is this law compatible with the Trinitarian-based law found in Scripture, particularly in the Ten Commandments? Is it a shorter or foggier version of biblical law, or is it another law-code altogether?

  • Does natural law allow for oaths of office or the use of oaths in courts? If so, in whose name should they be sworn?  And is that name a valid name for the Christian God and no other, or is it the name of some other yet-to-be-named deity?  (The State, perhaps?)

  • What exactly is murder? That is, who are those we are not to kill?  Does the answer depend on the age, gender, ethnicity, or medical fitness of the victim?

  • What is the just penalty for murder? Execution, imprisonment, rehabilitation, or maybe some kind of a mind-wipe?

  • What exactly constitutes theft? Is it theft if a poor man takes the property of a rich man?  What if the State does it for him?  What if the State calls it taxation? Or “nationalizing foreign holdings”? (What happens when “laws of nations” collide?)

  • What is the just penalty for theft? Restitution, imprisonment, or amputation?

  • Can civil government consider any sexual acts as crimes? If so, which ones?  What are the corresponding penalties for each act?

  • Should having more children than two be a civil crime? If so, what’s the proper sanction for that crime?

  • If there is disagreement to the answers given to the questions above, can we safely assume that those answers are wrong?

  • How many people have to agree with a certain answer before we should take them seriously? Everyone?  A significant majority?  A slight majority? How does natural law communicate the exact percentage?

  • If the answers to these questions are at odds with the law revealed in Scripture, can we assume that the God of the Bible is at war with the answers? Or, could He simply be mildly annoyed with them?

The Rise And Decline Of Natural Law


Is There Such A Thing As ‘Natural Law’?

Marcus Aurelius.



Bottom Line: Natural law is a pagan invention.  The Stoics came up with the idea to provide a universal law-order for the cosmopolitan world created by Alexander’s conquests.  Natural law, the Stoics said, is found in the divine intelligence or logos inherent in the cosmos itself (accessible to all right-thinking human beings).


Roman intellectuals picked up on this idea next.  “For there is one universe made up of all things, and one God who pervades all things, and one substance, and one law, one common reason in all intelligent animals, and one truth.” So wrote the philosopher Marcus Aurelius, the emperor whose “natural law” allowed for the persecution and murder of Christians.


Medieval theologians, philosophers, and legal experts brought natural law into Christian theology through a door marked “natural revelation.”  The muddy and confused concept of natural law, useful to kings and popes, continued through the Reformation and into the Enlightenment:  Greece to Rome to Aquinas to Locke.  But while some Christians today continue to profess natural law theory, most thinking atheists have given up on it altogether.  They usually cite Darwin.


Darwin’s doctrine of evolution completely rewrote man’s understanding of Nature.  Nature was no longer a given that could provide even a vague basis for law.  It was no longer a fixed metaphysical reality on which philosophers could hang any system.  Nature was process, always changing, always becoming.  No fixed laws.  Nature, then, is a perfect Hegelian synthesis … red in tooth and claw.  Laws like this, that move and change, are then laws of convention … the strongest kill the weakest.  This worked well for Stalin’s purges and Hitler’s death camps.  Think about it. If Nature is all there is, by what standard can you say Hitler, Stalin and Mao were wrong?


What standard would the Buddhist or Hindu use to condemn Hitler?


And so we come again to the absolute necessity of divine revelation.  We know right and wrong because God reveals it in Scripture.  There are no other standards.