Trump campaign chair Manafort indicted to cover CIA’s overthrow of Ukraine

Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s ex-campaign manager, has been indicted for colluding with Russia during the 2016 election.  To understand the charges against Paul Manafort, that incidentally have nothing to do with the Donald Trump campaign, you must look at the CIA’s overthrow of the elected government of Ukraine. 

According to Wikipedia “Viktor Fedorovych Yanukovych is a Ukrainian politician who was elected as the fourth President of Ukraine on February 7, 2010 in an election that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe called transparent and honest.”

Well there’s nothing America’s “elected” government hates more than transparent and honest elections.  We haven’t had one since 1996.  So, Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown in 2014 in a CIA and State Department color revolution after he rejected a loan from the IMF for a more favorable deal from Russia. 

The Obama Administration was furious and Senators John McCain, Lindsay Graham as well as Vice President Joe Biden and State Department’s Victoria Nuland all played prominent roles to overthrow of the democratically elected Yanukovych and the installation the billionaire chocolate magnate, Petro Poroshenko as President.    From Press TV:

Excerpt:

US ‘involved in criminal activities’ in Ukraine

The Obama administration is “involved in criminal activities” in Ukraine and facilitated last year’s “coup d'état” in Kiev, a former US Senate candidate says.  “They did so in conjunction with neo-Nazi elements in Kiev, they did so at the behest of Israel and the European central banks and the International Monetary Fund (IMF),” said Mark Dankof, who is also a broadcaster and pastor in San Antonio, Texas. 

“And of course this whole situation in Ukraine permitted the United States to continue the encirclement policy of Russia that has been going on since the end of the Cold War ,” he told Press TV on Monday...  Dankof cited Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland who revealed last year that Washington had invested about $5 billion to promote “democracy” in Ukraine.

“The worst aspect of this whole situation is that this [US] government continues to be involved in criminal activities in the eastern part of Ukraine, specifically targeting ethnically Russian people in the major urban areas of the eastern part of that country for genocidal activity,” he said. 

Ties between Washington and Moscow deteriorated last year after pro-Western forces ousted Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014…  The United States and the European Union have imposed several rounds of sanctions on Russia, including visa bans and asset freezes.  According to US officials, Washington is considering providing Ukrainian forces with lethal weapons.

Why did the U.S. Government provide lethal weapons to the Neo-Nazi’s to be for genocide against Russian speaking Ukrainians?  How is that promoting democracy? Oh, and that $5 billion Washington spent “promoting democracy in Ukraine”, was recovered when Ukraine’s gold was stolen and shipped in the dead of night to the Federal Reserve Bank in New York.  From 21stCentury Wire:

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The Latest Heist: US Quietly Snatches the Ukraine’s Gold Reserves

According to reports out of Kiev (see links below), the US has quietly transfers 33 tons of Ukrainian gold out of the country and back to vaults in the US. Presumably, this sovereign wealth transfer would be counted as partial “collateral” for a fresh round of IMF, US FED, and ECB paper debt that is currently being organised for dumping into the Ukraine’s economic black hole.

Multiple inquiries to US Federal Reserve administrators into the location of the Ukraine’s gold have been met with the proverbial ‘pass the buck’, making tracking and tracking the final resting place of these 33 tonnes very difficult indeed – but one can expect that the NY Fed is probably the institution who has masterminded this financial heist…

It’s worth pointing out here that when NATO sacked Libya in 2011, one of the first items that came into question was the gold in Libya’s state-run central bank. Prior to the NATO takeover of that country, Libya had one of the highest per capita gold reserves in the world, alongside Lebanon, giving Libya a distinct advantage should it carry out former Libyan leader Muammar Muhammad al-Gaddafi’s long-term financial transition to a gold-backed Libyan Dinar. As you can imagine, this is no longer the case in Tripoli.

Additionally, like Libya, both Syria and Iran are two of the world’s last remaining nation states who both have state-run central banks and gold reserves which fall outside of the world’s private central banking syndicate.

The price of a Washington brutally forced “democracy” is paid in gold.  But I digress, so let’s get back to the indictments against Paul Manafort.  Mueller’s indictments which can be read here, seem to be some thin gruel.  According to Fortune, Paul Manafort offered private briefings about the Trump campaign to a Russian Billionaire close to Putin. Hmmm, here’s the official story:

Excerpt:

Paul Manafort Offered 'Private Briefings' About Trump Campaign to Russian Billionaire

In the middle of Donald Trump’s presidential run, then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort said he was willing to provide “private briefings” about the campaign to a Russian billionaire the U.S. government considers close to Russian President Vladimir Putin…

Manafort spokesman Jason Maloni confirmed to The Associated Press that the email exchanges were legitimate but said no briefings ever occurred. The email involved an offer for Oleg Deripaska, a wealthy Russian who made his money in the aluminum business.  The July 7, 2016, email came a little over a week before the Republican National Convention, while Manafort was leading the Trump campaign’s day-to-day operations.

The Manafort email exchange regarding Deripaska is one of thousands of pages of material turned over to congressional committees by the Trump campaign…   The email is the first to indicate that Manafort was attempting to reach Deripaska while he was working on the Trump campaign… 

The Associated Press reported in March that before signing with Trump’s campaign, Manafort secretly worked for Deripaska and proposed plans… that he said could “greatly benefit the Putin Government…”   Deripaska sued the AP for defamation over the story in May in U.S. District Court in Washington, alleging the story was inaccurate and hurt his career by falsely accusing him of criminal activity.

Hmmm, seems like a lot of bullshit and suppositions regarding the relationship between Paul Manafort and this Deripaska guy.  This part seems really goofy “before signing with Trump’s campaign, Manafort secretly worked for Deripaska and proposed plans”… that he said could “greatly benefit the Putin Government…”   Really??  That just seems so crazy, so what is the story behind the Deripaska guy?  From The Telegraph:

Excerpt:

Vladimir Putin takes Oleg Deripaska to task

Vladimir Putin, the Russian prime minister, publicly criticised his most faithful oligarch on Thursday in an attempt to deflect growing social discontent on to the country’s unpopular super-rich. 

Mr Putin, who is a master at dispensing ritual humiliation, likened Oleg Deripaska to a cockroach and forced him to accompany him on a tour of Pikalevo, a factory town that has witnessed the most serious social unrest Russia has seen since the start of the global economic crisis.

Last week Pikalevo’s residents vented their anger over job losses and unpaid wages at one of the oligarch’s local factories by blocking a major road and causing a 250-mile traffic jam…  The prime minister rounded on the hapless tycoon as they toured a cement plant…

He then ordered the tycoon to pay all outstanding wages – £830,000 – before the day was out. Mr Deripaska was Russia’s richest man until last year. He has suffered a dramatic reversal of fortune as mounting debt has seen his assets shrink from £17?billion to about £2?billion today.

Analysts believe the Kremlin has saved him from bankruptcy — partly as a reward for his unquestioning loyalty and also to prevent his assets falling into the hands of Western banks… 

Mr Deripaska’s factory is among three upon which the town depends for survival. Mr Putin has floated the idea of renationalising the factories, which were privatised after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Mr Deripaska is an unloved figure in Russia. He was among a number of men who built their fortunes during the chaos of the 1990s. He faces a June 11 deadline to restructure billions of dollars in debt owed to international banks.

Hmmm, Deripaska was billions of dollars in debt to international banks in 2009 when Putin made him pay his workers their back wages and then bailed him out.  Putin did so because it was in Russia’s best interests not to have foreign banks owning a Russian factory.  Now in 2017 Deripaska is suddenly worth 6 billion and he is key to proving Russia collusion charges against Trump? 

Through marriage Deripaska was related to the Deep State’s Russian puppet Yeltsin, maybe there’s a correlation.  From Global Research:

Excerpt:

US Meddling in 1996 Russian Elections in Support of Boris Yeltsin

Americans are outraged by allegations that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an intelligence service to hack email accounts of the Democratic National Committee… But does the USA meddle in the presidential elections of other countries?  The answer to the first question, of course, is a resounding Yes…

Let us limit our discussion to one single case.  Readers will recall that in the run-up to the 1996 presidential election in Russia, opinion polls put the pro-western incumbent, Boris Yeltsin, in fifth place among the presidential candidates, with only 8% support.  The same polls showed that the most popular candidate in Russia by a wide margin was the Communist Party’s Gennady Zyuganov.

Moved to desperation by the numbers, well-connected Russian oligarchs suggested just cancelling the election and supporting a military takeover, rather than facing a defeat at the polls.  Neocons in the West embraced the idea–all in the name of Democracy, of course.  In the end, though, Yeltsin and the oligarchs decided to retain power by staging the election.

In keeping with Russian laws at the time, Zyuganov spent less than three million dollars on his campaign.  Estimates of Yeltsin’s spending, by contrast, range from $700 million to $2.5 billion…   In February 1996, at the urging of the United States, the International Monetary Fund… supplied a $10.2 billion “emergency infusion” to Russia.  The money disappeared as Yeltsin used it to shore up his reputation and to buy votes.  He forced the Central Bank of Russia to provide an additional $1 billion for his campaign, too.  Meanwhile, a handful of Russian oligarchs, notably several big contributors residing in Israel, provided more billions for the Yeltsin campaign. 

In the spring of 1996, Yeltsin and his campaign manager, billionaire privatizer Anatoly Chubais, recruited a team of financial and media oligarchs to bankroll the Yeltsin campaign and guarantee favorable media coverage on national television and in leading newspapers.  In return, Chubais allowed well-connected Russian business leaders to acquire majority stakes in some of Russia’s most valuable state-owned assets.

Campaign strategists for the former Republican governor of California Pete Wilson covertly made their way to the President Hotel in Moscow where, behind a guard and locked doors, they served as Yeltsin’s “secret campaign weapon” to save Russia for Democracy...  

It is now public record that the Yeltsin campaign conducted extensive “black operations,” including disrupting opposition rallies and press conferences, spreading disinformation among Yeltsin supporters, and denying media access to the opposition.  Finally, widespread bribery, voter fraud, intimidation, and ballot stuffing assured Yeltsin’s victory in the runoff election…

During Yeltsin’s second term, the “non-ideological” IMF provided another infusion of money, this time $40 billion.  Once again, more billions disappeared without a trace, much of it stolen by the President’s chronies, who placed it in foreign banks… 

Under Yeltsin’s tenure, the death rate in Russia reached wartime levels.  Accidents, food poisoning, exposure, heart attacks, lack of access to basic healthcare, and an epidemic of suicides—they all played a role…  “Western and Russian demographers now agree that between 1992 and 2000, the number of ‘surplus deaths’ in Russia–deaths that cannot be explained on the basis of previous trends–was between five and six million persons…”

By the time he left office, the American-approved President of the Russian Federation had an approval rating of 2%.  But by that time it didn’t matter:  the kleptocrats were safely installed in power, and American-imposed Democracy had achieved its aims in Russia’s “transition.”

That’s right, by the time Yeltsin left office “it didn’t matter because the kleptocrats like Oleg Deripaska were safely installed in power.”  And now Deripaska is the main link between Putin and the Trump Campaign.  Paul Manafort is just a scapegoat.  Manafort has been indicted for interfering with the CIA’s overthrow of the elected government of Ukraine. 

This kangaroo court that will hear the charges against Paul Manafort will be chosen very selectively.  If the Manafort case breaks wide open it will be the CIA, MI6 and the neocons and their minions in Washington who have the most to lose.  I don’t know about you, but I’m making popcorn and pulling up a chair.  This should be interesting.

By Patricia Baeten

Five ex-Presidents beg for hurricane relief on telethon as GOP passes trillions in tax cuts for Wall Street

What a world this has become, we are truly through the looking glass.  In what world would a country with four of its territories and 3 states leveled by hurricanes and fires pass trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the extremely rich?  From World Socialist Website:

Excerpt:

From hurricanes to tax cuts: The ruling class gets down to business

Even as the horrific destruction caused by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma is still being tallied, the US political establishment is moving rapidly to its main order of business: A massive handout for the corporate and financial elite.

Amidst this destruction, however, the US stock markets are on the rise—increasing significantly on both Monday and Tuesday. The reason is evident: the ruling elite is licking its collective chops at the prospect of a major cut in corporate and individual taxes for the wealthy.

Over the weekend, even as Irma was making landfall in Florida, Trump seized the moment to press for “dramatic tax cuts and tax reform.” With “what’s happened with the hurricane,” he said, “I’m gonna ask for a speed-up.”

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, the former Goldman Sachs banker and hedge fund manager (net worth $300 million), said on Tuesday that the White House is “super focused” on tax cuts, and that the administration is considering backdating these cuts to January 1 to provide a “big boon for the economy”—that is, for Wall Street.

So while the ruling elite are licking their collective chops” over the impending tax cuts, what is congress doing for Puerto Rico?  The American territories of Puerto Rico, Guam, Virgin Islands and the Marianas Islands have been the victims of the GOP and Wall Street predators for decades.  The Islands have been raped and savaged by the GOP with legalized slave labor, sex slavery and forced abortions, in what the ex-Speaker Tom Delay called “a petri dish of capitalism.”  Now Puerto Rico is really hurting.  From LaRouche Pub:

Excerpt:

Puerto Rico Faces Financial Disaster—There Is No Economy Left

Oct. 11, 2017 (EIRNS)—Puerto Rico’s Treasury Secretary Raul Maldonado told El Nuevo Día that the government will face a shutdown by Oct. 31 if Congress doesn’t intervene with additional funding.

In effect, there is no economy. Few businesses are operating, and therefore, people aren’t getting paid. Banks operate four hours a day. The official 12% unemployment rate will soar. McClatchy News Service also reports that the mainstay of the economy, agriculture, was devastated by hurricane Maria, with losses expected to top $2 billion, according to Agriculture Secretary Carlos Flores.

Nelson Morales, head of the Puerto Rican Electric Power Authority (PREPA), told El Nuevo Día that without aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), or both, it will be impossible to restore full power to the island.

PREPA only has $500 million on hand, which is nothing compared to what’s required to rebuild the system. Yesterday, FEMA and the USACE said they had contributed $54.6 million and $115 million, respectively, to assist PREPA, which still a drop in the bucket. Sources told the daily that PREPA will need at least $3 billion, and that is probably a low estimate, given that the entire power system really must be built from scratch.

If the horrific conditions the Islands have been forced to live under weren’t bad enough, the GOP has now passed legislation to worsen their fate.  Under the cover of “hurricane relief”, the package passed by the GOP is anything but.  From The Intercept:

Excerpt:

PUERTO RICO RELIEF BILL CANCELS $16 BILLION IN DEBT — BUT NOT FOR PUERTO RICO

HOUSE REPUBLICANS UNVEILED a $36.5 billion disaster relief supplemental package on Tuesday night, intended to pay for relief and rebuilding efforts for the floods, hurricanes, and wildfires of the past several months. It includes money for Puerto Rico’s ongoing struggle with the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, though only a fraction of that headline number. In fact, $5 billion of the funds earmarked for Puerto Rico comes in the form of a loan, increasing the amount of money the island will eventually need to pay back.

And in a cruel irony, the bill also contains $16 billion in debt relief – just not for Puerto Rico’s crushing debt…

The island will get an additional $150 million loan to cover its matching funds for FEMA grants. Cities and states are required to put a small amount of money into sharing costs for disaster relief. That brings the total of loans to the island up to $5.05 billion. The appropriations committee allotted another $29 million for administrative expenses for the loan…

This is critical for Puerto Rico, which has trouble borrowing from private credit markets because of its existing $74 billion debt. But instead of replenishing the coffers with a grant, this is a loan — one Puerto Rico will also need to repay.

What the F*&K???  While congress is passing trillions in tax cuts for Wall Street vultures, they have appropriated $5 billion that is to go directly to pay the hedge fund vultures via Puerto Rico.   How could this get through congress?  Don’t the islanders have representation in the House?  From The Hill:

Excerpt:

House GOP kills voting rights for D.C., Puerto Rico, other delegates

Along strict party lines, House lawmakers on Wednesday shot down legislation allowing delegates to retain certain voting powers.

The surprise vote — the first of the new Congress — surrounded a provision of the Republicans’ proposed rules package that would prevent the six House delegates from presiding over, or voting as part of, the Committee of the Whole — a mechanism used to expedite legislation by effectively turning the entire chamber into a committee.

Under the rules of the last Congress, the six delegates — representing the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands — were allowed to cast votes and preside over the Committee of the Whole. The Republican rules proposal would strip that power.

This is truly through the looking glass.  But this is just another case of Congress paying back their contributors.  If Puerto Rico were a state they would have been able to file bankruptcy.  That was not allowed by congress in this case, because Puerto Rico’s debt is held by the very vultures who fund their campaigns.  From Florida Politics:

Excerpt:

After taking donations from hedge funds holding Puerto Rican debt, Marco Rubio opposed bankruptcy

In opposing the bankruptcy filing for Puerto Rico, Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio said he does not believe in a “silver bullet.” Puerto Ricans should tighten their belts, he declared.

According to Casey Tolan of Fusion, what Rubio fails to mention is that he received thousands of dollars in campaign cash from individuals – particularly hedge fund executives – who would lose big if Puerto Rico filed for bankruptcy.

Tolan reports on campaign finance reports that show Rubio’s campaign received contributions from a minimum of six hedge fund managers holding Puerto Rican debt. The junior senator from Florida has been the only presidential candidate openly opposed to bankruptcy reform for Puerto Rico.

The GOP tax cuts are a loser for America, they always were and always will be.  Since the Reagan Administration the GOP talking points have been to push tax cuts as economic stimulus.  The claim that “tax cuts pay for themselves” is been proven false over and over again.  From Op Ed News:

Excerpt:

How and Why Did the U.S. Become the World's Biggest Debtor, and What Are the Implications?

How did a nation that was until relatively recently (in historical terms) the world's biggest net lender become the world's biggest net debtor? More importantly, what implications does this situation have for the U.S. and for the rest of the world?

To answer the first question we need to go back a few decades in time to the Reagan era, when I believe the seeds of the country's present debt problems were sown. President Reagan inherited a nation that was not only one of the two great military superpowers on earth, but also by far the world's wealthiest nation and biggest net lender…

Reagan was also an economic monetarist, a Right-Winger who believed in low taxes and small government at home, but also in maintaining a strong military defense force both at home and abroad.

In response to criticism from many mainstream economists that his economic policies of reduced taxation and increased government spending would eventually bankrupt the nation, Reagan pointed to the so-called "Laffer Curve," named after the economist Arthur Laffer. 

The Laffer Curve was interpreted by right-wing theorists to show that reduced taxation rates promote free enterprise and grow the economy, thereby, paradoxically, increasing, rather than reducing, Government revenue.

As things turned out, critics of the "Laffer Curve" were proven unambiguously right in practice. Massively reduced taxation under Reagan resulted proportionally in massively decreased Government revenue. This was just as most mainstream economists and common sense thinkers had predicted.

To make things worse, to go along with this sharp reduction in the Government's tax income, the Reagan administration simultaneously massively increased military spending--to levels the world had never seen. The combined massive reduction in Government income and massively increased expenditures overseas, and the consequent need for massive borrowing to make up the shortfall, transformed the U.S. virtually overnight from the world's biggest net lender to the biggest net debtor.

If there is one thing equally as scurrilous as the GOP tax cuts it’s the GOP budget.  Even Fareed Zakaria is calling the GOP budget plans fantastical delusions.  Trump’s right-wing GOP Budget Director Mick Mulvaney’s budget is looney tunes.  

Excerpt:

Fareed Zakaria slams Trump administration for smoke & mirrors budget

The number I want to focus on is three point four trillion dollars. At the end of May, the Trump administration released details of its proposed budget for the next fiscal year. And on July 13th the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released their analysis of President Trump's budget.

The CBO says the President's budget underestimated the loss in federal tax revenues caused by its proposed tax cuts by a whopping three point four trillion dollars. How could the smart Goldman Sachs guys on Trump's economic team, Gary Cohn, Steve Minuchin, make such a big basic math error. Actually, they did it intentionally.

The administration assumed that because of its tax cuts the American economy would grow by three percent a year for the next decade. The CBO instead says the president's plan would increase GDP growth to 1.9 percent which most economists agree is the sensible assumption. Note that the American economy has grown on average just 1.8 percent over the last years, no more.

This method of fudging the numbers is called dynamic scoring. Common sense would tell you that if the government cuts taxes it'll get less money in tax revenues. But sprinkle the magic pixie dust of dynamic scoring and you can project much higher growth rates and then the revenue numbers saw upwards in theory…

In fact, the national debt tripled under Ronald Reagan. And After George W Bush cut taxes the national debt increased again. Bill Clinton by contrast actually raise taxes and ushered in stronger growth and higher tax revenues. But the mountains of evidence have not stopped Republicans from using dynamic scoring.

Science, logic and reason never permeate the GOP psyche.  Now they have passed the largest tax cuts in the history of the universe that will go directly to the top 1% with the “hope” that they will create jobs.  The House and Senate are reconciling their individual “Frankenstein” bills and one thing is for sure, whatever comes out will be a horrible nightmare for the American people. 

This is what America has come to, we have five ex-Presidents hawking for money on a telethon to repair damages from hurricanes. What a world this has become.  What kind of people are these in congress?  Are so they so sick and disgusting that they are unaffected by other’s grief.  What kind of politicians in a country with four of its territories and 3 states leveled by hurricanes and fires passes trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the extremely rich? 

By Patricia Baeten

Itching for war, Deep State’s Haley, McMaster and Pompeo plot ouster of peacemaker Tillerson

The position of Secretary of State is a unique one.  The SOS has a position that is more powerful than the Vice President as the position is almost a co-presidency.  America’s top diplomat advises the president on issues of foreign policy, but in the end advances the president’s agenda.  Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who is not a political insider has been the victim of a concerted effort to oust him by a consortium Washington elite.

The Deep State is itching for war, and their warmongering minions, UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster and CIA Director Mike Pompeo are now vying for the coveted position of Secretary of State.  After the ouster of President Trump’s National Security Advisor, General Mike Flynn, his replacement H.R. McMaster purged the NSA of Flynn’s advisors.  H.R. McMaster has surrounded himself with Obama holdovers whose mission is to thwart the agenda of the President Trump and the American people.  From Miami Herald:

Excerpt:

Washington loves Gen. McMaster, but Trump does not

For the Washington establishment, President Trump’s decision to make General H.R. McMaster his national security adviser in February was a masterstroke…

But inside the White House, the McMaster pick has not gone over well with the one man who matters most. White House officials tell me Trump himself has clashed with McMaster in front of his staff. On policy, the faction of the White House loyal to senior strategist Steve Bannon is convinced McMaster is trying to trick the president into the kind of nation-building that Trump campaigned against…

Trump has complained in front of McMaster in intelligence briefings about “the general undermining my policy,” according to two White House officials… 

The roots of the McMaster-Trump tensions begin in February, when the general was hired after his first meeting with the president. McMaster replaced another general, Michael Flynn. Both Vice President Mike Pence and Priebus supported getting rid of Flynn.   Trump himself has defended Flynn publicly…

For a president who puts so much value in personal relationships and loyalty, Flynn’s departure was a blow…

Then Trump’s inner circle began clashing with McMaster over personnel. This began with Ezra Cohen Watnick, who remains the senior director for intelligence at the National Security Council. McMaster initially sided with the CIA and wanted to remove this Flynn appointee from his position, but eventually McMaster changed his mind…

That dispute was followed by a bigger one. Bannon and Trump, according to White House officials, pressed McMaster to fire a list of Obama holdovers at the National Security Council who were suspected of leaking to the press… The list of names was compiled by Derek Harvey, a former Defense Intelligence Agency colonel who was initially hired by Flynn. McMaster balked. He refused to fire anyone…

And finally, the White House chief of staff himself blocked McMaster this month from hiring Brigadier Gen. Ricky Waddell as his deputy…

The CIA controlled media has escalated the calls for Tillerson’s removal citing ANONYMOUS sources in the “Moron-gate” investigation.  Moron-gate is a creation of Fake News designed to drive a wedge between President Trump and his pacifistic Secretary of State opening the door for a GOP warmongering insider to take over.  From The Daily Beast:

Excerpt:

White House Aides Wanted Rex Tillerson to Resign for Calling Trump a ‘Fucking Moron’

The Secretary of State has few allies inside 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. But he and Trump soldier on in a loveless marriage.  As Secretary of State Rex Tillerson took to the microphones Wednesday morning to address reports that he had called his boss, President Donald Trump, a “fucking moron,” aides in the White House held out hope that he would offer his resignation.

Tillerson didn’t deny having questioned the president’s intellectual capacities. But he insisted that he wasn’t going anywhere either, much to the chagrin of three White House officials who vented to The Daily Beast in real time about how they wished he would “just leave,” as one put it.

“In a perfect world” he would have quit right then and there, another said.  The wish of certain White House officials to be rid of Tillerson is not confined to a select few inside the walls of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. It is a sentiment shared among many in senior staff that has been building for months...  

The latest point of tension between the White House and Tillerson came early Wednesday morning, when NBC News reported that Tillerson had strongly considered resigning over Trump’s July speech to the annual jamboree of the Boy Scouts of America… 

The report also detailed that Tillerson had called Trump a “moron;” … and that the Secretary of State had questioned U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s utility in the administration…

According to five senior Trump administration officials, current and former… it had been gossip within the White House that Tillerson had called Trump a “moron” or an “idiot” during an official meeting over the summer.  Trump… tweeted repeatedly that it was a “fake” story and repeated the claim during a stop in Las Vegas to visit the site of the country’s deadliest mass shooting in recent history…

Tillerson has also frequently clashed with White House staffers…   and he has butted heads with Stephen Miller, the conservative senior policy adviser…

Widespread antipathy to Tillerson in the West Wing represents “a rapid deterioration of [his] relationship with the White House,” THE EX-OFFICIAL SAID. Just months ago, “Rex was [the] cabinet official you most often saw on public schedule meetings with the president.”

Unfortunately Steve Bannon is no longer in the White House as a voice of reason against the Washington war mongering juggernaut.  With General Flynn and Steve Bannon ousted from the Trump White House, President Trump is surrounded by a constant barrage from the CIA and the Generals.  From TheIntercept: 

Excerpt:

$21 Trillion Missing – U.S. Government a Criminal Enterprise – Catherine Austin Fitts

Investment advisor and former Assistant Secretary of Housing Catherine Austin Fitts says you can add $21 trillion of missing federal money on top of the $20 trillion U.S. deficit. It’s all in a new explosive report on Solari.com.  Fitts explains, “This is $65,000 for every man, woman and child resident in America...  We know that the U.S. government has been run like a criminal enterprise from a financial standpoint…”

The missing money is called “undocumentable adjustments,” but that may just be a polite name for theft, fraud and crime against “We the People…”  They have done that by basically hijacking the federal credit and using it to help centralize power under them. 

So, we have to reverse that, and the Constitution is the tool to hold them accountable.  All their arguments just fall down when you realize they have just stolen an enormous amount of money from the federal government outside the law. . . . The U.S. Federal government doesn’t have information sovereignty, and it doesn’t have financial sovereignty.  So, we have to return it to that, and we have to keep that mechanism open long enough to get this money back.”

Fitts contends the Deep State swamp creatures do not want to give the money back and want to tear up the U.S. Constitution in order to keep all those trillions of stolen dollars…  “You want to preserve the Constitution because you want to have individual sovereignty, and you want your taxes to only go into things that have financial and national sovereignty…  

They say we have $20 trillion in debt, and there is no money.  It’s a very different policy discussion if I can say, wait a minute, there’s $20 trillion in debt, but you stole $21 trillion . . . and we’re putting that back on the table for purposes of this policy discussion.”

In other words, “We the People” could pay off the entire federal deficit with the money that was stolen and still have $1 trillion left over.

Fitts also says, “Here’s the magic trick. You don’t need everybody to change this.  It only takes 5% to 10% of the population to completely turn this around.  It doesn’t take everybody, and that is one of the things that has got them so scared. . . . We don’t need to implode the federal government.  We need to take it back, clean it up and get it to run according to the law.”

So where did the $21 trillion congress stole go?  Into the shadow government set up after the 911 attacks.  Sure the shadow government existed before, but in 2000 during the recount of the Presidential election, the US Senate deregulated the insurance industry and derivatives trading causing the 2008 banking meltdown and the transfer of trillions of dollars from the Federal Reserve into the shadow government.  From Vanity Fair:

Excerpt:

WASHINGTON’S $8 BILLION SHADOW

Mega-contractors such as Halliburton and Bechtel supply the government with brawn. But the biggest, most powerful of the “body shops”—SAIC, which employs 44,000 people and took in $8 billion last year—sells brainpower, including a lot of the “expertise” behind the Iraq war…

… the largest government contractor you’ve never heard of: a company known simply by the nondescript initials SAIC (for Science Applications International Corporation)…  SAIC maintains its headquarters in San Diego, but its center of gravity is in Washington, D.C.

With a workforce of 44,000, it is the size of a full-fledged government agency—in fact, it is larger than the departments of Labor, Energy, and Housing and Urban Development combined.

Its anonymous glass-and-steel Washington office—a gleaming corporate box like any other—lies in northern Virginia, not far from the headquarters of the C.I.A., whose byways it knows quite well…   SAIC has been awarded more individual government contracts than any other private company in America.

The contracts number… in the thousands: SAIC currently holds some 9,000 active federal contracts in all. More than a hundred of them are worth upwards of $10 million apiece. Two of them are worth more than $1 billion.

The company’s annual revenues, almost all of which come from the federal government, approached $8 billion in the 2006 fiscal year, and they are continuing to climb. SAIC’s goal is to reach as much as $12 billion in revenues by 2008. As for the financial yardstick that really gets Wall Street’s attention—profitability—SAIC beats the S&P 500 average…

To get some idea of the scale: contractors absorb the taxes paid by everyone in America with incomes under $100,000. In other words, more than 90 percent of all taxpayers might as well remit everything they owe directly to SAIC or some other contractor rather than to the IRS…

An SAIC executive once gave a press interview and referred to the enterprise as a “stealth company,” a characterization that is accurate and that has stuck. “Nobody knows who they are…”

Which is all the more remarkable in light of two developments. The first is a mounting collection of government audits and lawsuits brought by former employees for a variety of reasons, some of them personal and some coming under federal whistle-blower statutes…

The second development is that several of SAIC’s biggest projects have turned out to be colossal failures…   One involves the National Security Agency, America’s intelligence-gathering “electronic ear” and for many years SAIC’s biggest customer…  Four years and more than a billion dollars later, the effort has been abandoned…  Happily for SAIC…  The company has been awarded the contract for a revised Trailblazer…  The contract is worth $361 million.

Another failed effort involves the F.B.I., which paid SAIC $124 million to bring the bureau, whose computer systems are among the most primitive in American law enforcement, into at least the late 20th century…  Three years and a million lines of garbled computer code later, V.C.F. has been written off by a global publication for technology professionals as “the most highly publicized software failure in history…”

Much to the embarrassment of a company entrusted with some of the nation’s most precious secrets, its San Diego offices were mysteriously burgled in January of 2005… burglars managed to break into SAIC’s headquarters, pry open 13 private offices, and walk out with one desktop-computer hard drive and four laptops.

By SAIC’s account, the computers contained personal data on thousands of present and past employees, presumably including the company’s many former C.I.A. operatives, N.S.A. executives, and Pentagon officials. To date, the burglary remains unsolved.

With all the war mongering and money making there is one faction that the neocons and neoliberals just don’t care about, that is our military members and their families.  From Geopolitics:

Excerpt:

No Wonder US Forces in Morale Crisis

The spate of deadly US Navy collisions is a symptom of a wider morale crisis among American military forces. Part of the reason is that American troops are simply exhausted from being abused by political masters in Washington.

“Over-stretch” is one way of putting it. American forces continue to be assigned in overseas wars and operations around the globe with no end in sight. And for no credible purpose either.

This is not just a Navy problem. It affects all other branches of the US military: Army, Air Force, the Marines and National Guard.  When President Donald Trump announced his brazen U-turn sending more American troops back to Afghanistan, the move had the backing of the Pentagon’s top brass. No doubt stock prices for US arms manufacturers spiked.

But what about ordinary American soldiers? One can imagine renewed Afghan missions are not welcome, given that the US has been fighting its longest war – 16 years – in that country known as the “Graveyard of Empires.” 

Any army is only as good as the morale among soldiers. Morale depends on having a respected leadership and a credible just cause. In America’s case, there are neither of these attributes, therefore it is no surprise that morale diminishes, as does fighting effectiveness. Look at the appalling record of US military defeats or failures…

American troops no doubt know what’s going down on the ground. They will know that the Pentagon and CIA are arming and training terrorist death squads in Syria, Iraq, and, yes, Afghanistan.

I would like to tell our military members that help is on the way but I can’t.  The Deep State is itching for war, and if successful in strong arming Tillerson out as Secretary of State war is inevitable.  CIA Director Pompeo is the popular choice among the CIA controlled media.  Pompeo is the ideal choice for the Deep State, given his views Pompeo will be more than happy to scratch that itch.  From Stephen Lendman:

Excerpt:

Neocon CIA Director Pompeo’s Venom

The agency operates unaccountably, its diabolical agenda incompatible with democratic values and rule of law principles.  It’s mostly a global Mafia hit squad. Its unchecked power threatens everyone. As long as it exists, no one anywhere is safe.

Imperialism is tyranny by another name. The CIA acts as its enforcer. America is the United States of Amnesia, learning nothing from its imperial history, repeating the same mistakes, ordinary people at home and abroad suffering most.

Pompeo is the latest in a long line of rogue CIA directors. At an Aspen, Colorado security summit last week, he substituted venom and fiction for truth-telling.

Pompeo: “ The agency, along with our great partners from DOD and foreign partners are working diligently to defeat ISIS in” the Middle East.

Fact: Washington created and supports ISIS and likeminded terrorist groups, using them as imperial foot soldiers, the CIA heavily involved in arming, funding, training and directing their fighters.

Pompeo: “Iran is the world’s largest state sponsor of terror, and they now have a significant foothold in Syria.”

Fact: Iran is the region’s leading proponent of peace and stability. It’s aiding its Syria ally combat the scourge of US-supported terrorism…

Pompeo: “America’s interests (involve) providing the conditions (for) a more stable Middle East.”

Fact: America pursues its “interests” by raping and destroying one country after another in the region and elsewhere.

Pompeo: “Assad is not a stabilizing influence in Syria…(I)t is difficult to imagine a stable Syria that still has (him) in power.”  “He is a puppet of the Iranians and therefore it seems an unlikely situation where Assad will be sitting on the throne and America’s interests will be well served.”

Fact: Assad is overwhelmingly supported by Syrians, wanting no one else leading them.

Pompeo: Russia’s interest in Syria is to have “a warm water naval port, and they love to stick it to America.”

Fact: Russian/Syrian relations go back decades. They “stick it” to no other country. America “stick(s) it” to everybody everywhere.

Pompeo: Asked if Russia pursues a serious anti-ISIS strategy, Pompeo said “(no).”

Fact: Russia is smashing ISIS, driving Pompeo and other neocons in Washington nuts for defeating its imperial agenda in Syria.

Pompeo: “…America has an obligation to push back against” Russia.

Fact: America represents the greatest threat to world peace, Russia and China the best hope to preserve it.

Let’s hope President Trump doesn’t cave to the barrage of CIA controlled media reporting an “irreparable schism” between the president and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson over Fake News’ fabricated “Moron-gate.”  The Deep State is itching for war and ready to go, the only thing in their way is Secretary of State Tillerson.  With General Kelly guarding access to the president and the CIA’s Mike Pompeo, personally handfeeding Trump the CIA’s propaganda laced pap in the Daily Briefing, God knows what will happen.  Hopefully Trump will hold strong.

By Patricia Baeten

Wall Street Vulture’s premeditated murder of Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico is the canary in the coal mine for America’s controlled demolition by Wall Street Banks.  During WWII the transatlantic liner the St.Louis was sent on a voyage to America where its Jewish passengers would be denied admittance and returned to Germany to face certain death.  The purpose of the trip was to gauge the world’s tolerance for the Nazi annihilation of the Jews. 

Puerto Rico is today’s liner, the St. Louis.  What will be gauged is American’s tolerance for the total annihilation of the American territory of Puerto Rico and its American citizens for Wall Street profits.  Our “elected” officials are complicit in the annihilation of Puerto Rico on behalf of their campaign donors.  Case in point, Florida Senator Marco Rubio’s long, long service to his master, Vulture Capitalist Paul Singer.  Interesting that Senator Rubio is a loud voice in advocating for hurricane relief for Puerto Rico, but whose relief is Rubio really interested in?  From Gregory Palast:

Excerpt:

Rubio’s Billionaire wins ransom from Argentina

Paul Singer, known as The Vulture, won a $4.65 billion payment from Argentina — nearly ONE HUNDRED TIMES his "investment" of $50 million in old Argentina bonds.  It was, in finance speak, the most successful "vulture attack" ever.

Singer’s actions are outlawed in most of the civilized world. Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, attempted to stop Singer’s predatory act, but Singer did a brilliant end-run:  he used his cash to help elect a new President in Argentina that would jump to his tune and pay him billions.

Now, he’s attempting to do the same to the USA:  pick a president for us who will feather his vulture's nest.  He’s the number one donor sugar daddy for Marco Rubio’s candidacy…

Rubio, in fact, skirted some ethical lines in his attempts to pressure the State Department to side with his corpse-chewing donor against Argentina…  Rubio’s affection for carrion-eating birds has no decent bounds. While Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders are currently siding with Puerto Rico against a whole flock of vulture financiers. Sanders and Clinton support Rico’s plea for the same bankruptcy protections afforded the 50 states (and afforded to Donald Trump).

But Rubio has actually switched positions. The Senator, who originally supported bankruptcy rights for Puerto Ricans, turned on a dime the moment Vulture financier Andrew Herenstein of Monarch Capital announced he would hold a big fundraiser for Marco in the Hamptons.

Rubio now is calling for Puerto Rico to lay off teachers and sanitation workers to pay more to Herenstein and his fellow vultures–financiers already cranking profits on Puerto Rico bonds.

Watching Rubio flip his positions to his donors’ wishes is like watching one of those little doggies glued to the top of an old mechanical piggy bank who jump through a clown’s hoop when you put a coin in their snout.

Well, God bless America

My, my, my.  Little Marco knows who butters his bread.  Our bought and paid for congress refused to allow Puerto Rico file for bankruptcy, like any state would.  Congress appointed a board, like the Emergency Manager that was appointed for Detroit, to look out for the interests of the creditors of Puerto Rico over that of the people.

While huge numbers of dumbed down Americans don’t even know that the citizens of Puerto Rico are Americans, Little Marco’s Wall Street vulture buddies are circling the remains.  From The Intercept:

Excerpt:

PUERTO RICO REJECTS LOAN OFFERS, ACCUSING HEDGE FUNDS OF TRYING TO PROFIT OFF HURRICANES

PUERTO RICO HAS rejected a bondholder group’s offer to issue the territory additional debt as a response to the devastation from Hurricane Maria. Officials with Puerto Rico’s Fiscal Agency and Financial Advisory Authority said the offer was “not viable” and would harm the island’s ability to recover from the storm.

The Prepa (Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority) Bondholder Group made the offer on Wednesday, which included $1 billion in new loans, and a swap of $1 billion in existing bonds for another $850 million bond. These new bonds would have jumped to the front of the line for repayment, and between that increased value and interest payments after the first two years, the bondholders would have likely come out ahead on the deal, despite a nominal $150 million in debt relief.

Indeed, the offer was worse in terms of debt relief than the one the bondholder group made in April, well before hurricanes destroyed much of the island’s critical infrastructure.

Puerto Rico’s Fiscal Agency and Financial Advisory Authority suggested that profit motive rather than altruism was the bondholder group’s real goal.  Thomas Wagner of Knighthead Capital Management, one of the members of the bondholder group, admitted as much on Bloomberg TV yesterday, saying “What we’re trying to do is lend where our investors are not disadvantaged.” He added that the loan could be a “win-win” for the utility and the bondholders, “where the capital is not expensive...”

The island’s 3.4 million residents were without power in the immediate aftermath of the storm, and most continue without power today. Prepa has limited ability to restore the grid, given the island’s cash-strapped status…

Despite growing calls for debt relief, no bondholder has said they would supply it in the days following the storm, nor have creditor lawsuits been withdrawn.

Absolutely astonishing, the Wall Street vultures offer only deeper debt with loans that reap exorbitant Wall Street profits in return for water and power.  Wall Street banks are using their massive control over the US congress to impede the hurricane aid from reaching Puerto Rico in order to place their interests ahead of others. 

President Trump has come under vicious attack by the media and congress for tweeting:

Texas & Florida are doing great but Puerto Rico, which was already suffering from broken infrastructure & massive debt, is in deep trouble…  …It's old electrical grid, which was in terrible shape, was devastated. Much of the Island was destroyed, with billions of dollars...  ...owed to Wall Street and the banks which, sadly, must be dealt with. Food, water and medical are top priorities - and doing well. 

Of course the media, along with members of congress and the usual Trump haters went into overdrive condemning Trump for bringing up Wall Street’s financial enslavement of Puerto Rico at a time of catastrophe.  But that is exactly the time to bring it up, when the vultures are circling.  From Slate:

Excerpt:

How Can Puerto Rico’s Debt Problems Be “Dealt With”?

Trump seems to understand banks and hedge funds will trouble the island’s recovery. There’s only one thing for him to do.

On Tuesday, President Trump said something about Puerto Rico that was sort of right…

Of the American locales that have been hit by hurricanes in recent weeks, he wrote in a series of tweets, “Texas & Florida are doing great but Puerto Rico, which was already suffering from broken infrastructure & massive debt, is in deep trouble. It’s old electrical grid, which was in terrible shape, was devastated. Much of the Island was destroyed, with billions of dollars owed to Wall Street and the banks, which, sadly, must be dealt with.”

One way of interpreting Trump’s tweet salad is that he was saying the wreckage of Hurricane Maria was somehow Puerto Rico’s fault…

The more charitable and hopeful way of reading Trump’s tweets is that Puerto Rico needs to be rebuilt and reconstructed—and that unfortunately, it must do so at a time when it is already crippled by the interest payments it must make to banks and bondholders…  

Simply put, it won’t be possible to reconstruct Puerto Rico’s infrastructure, economy, or society without reconstructing its finances. If that’s what Trump was going for, it’s dead-on…

Wall Street and the banks do, indeed, have to be “dealt with.” And perhaps they need to be dealt with in the same way that Trump has dealt with banks, Wall Street, and real estate lenders throughout his career: by telling them to take a hike and settle for far less than they expected. 

Given that many of Puerto Rico’s systems were decrepit and outdated—the island generates electricity by shipping in oil and burning it—the destruction presents an opportunity not simply to rebuild, but to build a more effective and resilient one. But that takes a lot of money. And the reconstruction can’t be funded simply with insurance payments or even with whatever handouts the Republican Congress will provide.

Bondholders don’t pause for weather. In order to stay current on debt, entities in Puerto Rico have to keep making interest payments—even when they’re not collecting revenues. Some of the first cash that Puerto Rico’s power authority and other government agencies get from insurance or government aid will be funneled to the pockets of bondholders.

The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, which provides electricity on the island, has $9 billion in debt and was in bankruptcy before the hurricane hit. Each year, it is on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars of interest payments—all before it can spend a penny on fuel, salaries, upkeep, or transformation...

The same holds true for Puerto Rico at large, which has $73 billion in debt. This in a territory with a GDP of $103 billion—Puerto Rico is about the size of Mississippi and about as poor. Again, the first $3 billion to $4 billion of revenue Puerto Rico generates each year goes to pay interest without making a dent in the total…

Is this sad landscape what Trump had in mind with his tweets? OK, I doubt it. But Puerto Rico doesn’t just need a haircut of 15 to 20 percent on its debt, which is common in bankruptcies. It needs a buzz cut with large chunks of debt either forgiven, wiped out, written off as uncollectable, or assumed by the federal government. That’s how its problems can be “dealt with.” Will Trump deal with them?

Puerto Rico’s public health was a catastrophe before the hurricane.  After the Hurricane is sure to be worse.  From Stephen Lendman:

Excerpt:

Puerto Rico: A Public Health Catastrophe

Acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke deplorably called the federal response to crisis conditions in Puerto Rico a “good news story,” adding she’s “very satisfied.”  San Juan Mayor Yulin Cruz emotionally responded, saying “(w)ell, maybe from where she’s standing it’s a good-news story…”

“When you’re drinking from a creek, it’s not a good-news story. When you don’t have food for a baby, it’s not a good-news story…”  Cruz continued adding “(d)ammit, this is not a good-news story. This is a people-are-dying story. This is a life-or-death story.”  “This is ‘there’s a truckload of stuff that cannot be taken to people’ story. This is a story of devastation that continues to worsen because people are not getting food or water…”

Around half the population has no access to drinking water. Hospitals can’t function normally, struggling to keep seriously ill patients alive…  Supplies delivered to ports are stuck in docks for lack of transportation. Nearly two weeks ago, the strongest hurricane in nearly 90 years devastated the Island, creating crisis conditions for its 3.4 million residents.

On Monday, Florida International University Dean Tomas Guilarte said conditions in Puerto Rico continue deteriorating. A public health catastrophe looms.  “When the sewer system stops working, wastewater – aka human feces and urine – and seaborne bacteria contaminate the water supply.”

“This leads to bacterial infections – such as cholera, dysentery, E. coli and typhoid – that can be disastrous. The typical treatments, like tetanus shots or powerful antibiotics, are not readily available on the island, where medical supplies are quickly running out.”

According to FEMA, 58 of the island’s 69 hospitals have no power or fuel for generators. Only one is operating normally. Water can’t be boiled to kill bacteria. Some toxins become concentrated by the boiling process.  It kills harmful organisms, not toxic chemicals, compounds, salts, and heavy metals. Disease-causing pathogens contaminated areas affected by floodwaters.

Toxicity seeping from Puerto Rico’s Battery Recycling Company in the Arecibo coastal area alone “could be off the charts,” said Guilarte…  Immediate congressional action is vital, appropriating enough funds for food, medical supplies and medicines, along with other essentials to life.

Most islanders are impoverished. Residents EVACUATED BY GOVERNMENT AIRCRAFT and other means of transportation have to sign promissory notes to repay the cost, a disgraceful situation.

It’s amazing how Wall Street interests are impervious to human suffering if it gets in the way of profits.  For instance, the Jones Act, an archaic law which prohibits foreign countries from shipping goods directly into ports in Puerto Rico was temporarily suspended by the Trump Administration.  Now some Senators are calling for ending the outdated Jones Act.  From The Hill:

Excerpt:

   

McCain repeats call for Jones Act repeal following Puerto Rico waiver

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on Thursday repeated his call to repeal the Jones Act after the Trump administration announced a temporary lift on shipping restrictions for Puerto Rico as it recovers from Hurricanes Maria and Irma.

“Trump admin has finally waived #JonesAct for #PuertoRico. Now Congress must repeal this law to aid long-term recovery,” McCain wrote on Twitter.  

Lawmakers this week have pushed for a one-year waiver of the law, which mandates that American-owned and -operated vessels transport cargo between U.S. ports, so that Puerto Rico can receive much-needed aid after being battered by two major hurricanes in the last month.  McCain this week re-upped his call to repeal the law, which he has called “archaic and burdensome.”

“It is unacceptable to force the people of Puerto Rico to pay at least twice as much for food, clean drinking water, supplies and infrastructure due to Jones Act requirements as they work to recover from this disaster,” the senator wrote in a letter to acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke.  The Trump administration early Thursday announced a 10-day waiver to the Jones Act that goes into effect immediately.

Gee, only a 10-day waiver from the punitive Jones Act that forces the people of Puerto Rico to pay twice as much for “food, clean drinking water, supplies and infrastructure” seems unconscionable under any circumstances.  Who could possibly be against this?  From The Intercept:

Excerpt:

U.S. SHIPPING LOBBY: LETTING FOREIGN SHIPS BRING GOODS TO PUERTO RICO COULD ENDANGER NATIONAL SECURITY

ALLOWING FOREIGN SHIPS to bring goods to hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico would be a grave threat to national security, warned a handful of American shipping companies who have the trade routes locked down thanks to a century-old law.  They wanted to see that law left in place, thank you very much.

Puerto Rico, suffering from the combined forces of economic collapse, debt-driven austerity, and Hurricane Maria’s devastation, faces restrictions on imports from foreign registered ships under the Jones Act, a law supported by a small but powerful group of American companies that dominate U.S.-Puerto Rico shipping routes…

Many have recently argued that the law has dragged down the Puerto Rican economy by artificially increasing costs for island residents and businesses…  Resistance to the waiver came as millions of Americans were without clean drinking water, facing a life-threatening situation that has already turned deadly for some.

Puerto Rico is a Wall Street chattel state and congress will do nothing to save lives if it slashes into the billions Vulture Capitalists can make there.  Congress’ response is always the same “privatization.”  Privatization is anti-American.  From The Nation:

Excerpt:

Privatization ‘Disproportionately Hurts Poor Individuals and Families’

When public services get handed over to private corporations, poor Americans lose.

In a compendium of privatization disasters, the watchdog group In the Public Interest (ITPI) concludes that “government privatization disproportionately hurts poor individuals and families.” By shifting social costs onto the public, the market logic of “personal responsibility” serves as a pretext for a self-perpetuating spiral of social disinvestment.

One way privatization fleeces the poor is by making basic public services cost more…   ITPI points to privatization schemes for water and electricity systems, which have hiked user fees for outsourced utilities, but suffered from a decline in the quality of services, and that spiking rates “particularly harm low-income residents and those on fixed-incomes.”

On the national level, under the semi-private Affordable Care Act, overall costs for the public health-care “consumers” are virtually uncontrolled, but the free market draws from unlimited spigots of government subsidies…

There are a myriad of examples of graft, corruption and kickbacks baked into the cake of privatization.  However, congress never learns from experience, if that experience interferes with their personal profiteering off the public trough.  From The Intercept:

Excerpt:

HURRICANE IRMA UNLEASHES THE FORCES OF PRIVATIZATION IN PUERTO RICO

VULTURES CIRCLING THE wreckage of Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane Irma are closing in on a long-sought prize: the privatizing of the island’s electric utility…  “[The investors] have the best sales pitch now,” Carlos Gallisá, a former consumer representative on Prepa’s board of directors, told The Intercept by phone from San Juan. “They have already started, saying that only privatization will serve the people.”

For struggling governments around the world, privatizing utilities has come to be seen as a kind of get-rich-quick scheme, offering an upfront infusion of cash to underfunded municipalities... The blackout following Irma just added fuel to the fire. Days before Irma hit, Rosselló emphasized that privatization is firmly on the table…

According to a Friday report from Reorg Research, a trade publication for investors, creditors and members of Puerto Rico’s federally appointed financial oversight board have met with Prepa top brass in recent days to discuss a new “transformation plan” aimed at privatizing major aspects of the power authority…

In radio interviews after the storm, a representative from the Electrical Industry and Irrigation Workers Union (UTIER) that represents Prepa workers denounced the utility’s leadership for not sending 170 available workers out to reconnect lines and accused it of delaying restoration to build support for a corporate selloff.

Since the day that General Kelly took over as Trump’s Chief of Staff, the President’s information has been heavily filtered and only that information General Kelly wants the president to see is presented.  When President Trump lands in Puerto Rico Tuesday he may get a rude awakening.

Puerto Rico is the canary in the coal mine for Wall Street’s controlled demolition of America.  How goes Puerto Rico, goes the rest of the Nation.  If Puerto Rico is busted up and sold off to the highest bidders and congress floods the private hedge funds with Treasury cash to rebuild, Wall Street will be unstoppable. However, if President Trump deals with banks, Wall Street, and real estate lenders like he has dealt with them throughout his career he’ll tell them to take a hike and settle for far less than they expected.

By Patricia Baeten