Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Call him Mr. Obvious: Trump tells truth about MBS, Russia/Ukraine dust up and politically biased judges





“I never did give them hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.” ― Harry S. Truman

What a month it has been, a month dripping with hypocrisy and faux outrage.  It’s hard to say which issue has been the winner, is it the bullshit about Trump failing to condemn Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) for the murder of Saudi citizen and Washington Post “journalist” Jamal Khashoggi, or the so-called special relationship of the US Deep State with the Saudi Government or is it the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court’s unprecedented attack on the President of the United States for stating what everyone knows is true, judges are appointed by Democrats and Republicans specifically for their political bias. 

Judges in America are anything but umpires who call “balls and strikes,” they are appointed to further the deep state agenda or they wouldn’t have made it to the highest courts in America.  Give me a break Justice Roberts.  Judges are appointed specifically for their party affiliation and their service to the Deep State, after all it was five corrupt Republican Supreme Court justices who overturned the results of an American election in 2000 and installed Republican George W. Bush as president. 

Bush immediately kicked off the destruction of America, first through trillions in tax cuts for the rich while simultaneously starting endless, trillion dollar wars to wipe out the Clinton billions in surpluses turning America into a debtor nation.  Anyone remember Prince Bandar bin Sultan - Saudi Arabia's most famous arms dealer, longtime former ambassador to the US who was affectionately called Bandar Bush for his close ties to the Bush Crime Family?  It seems that some of the outrage being generated against MBS by the CIA has something to do with Bandar Bush being arrested by MBS last year for corruption.  From Tyler Durden at ZeroHedge:


Excerpt:

Saudi "Deep State" Prince Bandar Among Those Arrested In Purge: Report

According to a new report by Middle East Eye, Prince Bandar bin Sultan - Saudi Arabia's most famous arms dealer, longtime former ambassador to the US, and recent head of Saudi intelligence - was among those detained as part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's (MBS) so-called "corruption purge" that started with the initial arrests of up to a dozen princes and other top officials last weekend.

If confirmed, the arrest and detention of Bandar would constitute the most significant and high profile figure caught up in the purge - even above that of high profile billionaire investor Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal - given Bandar's closeness to multiple US administrations and involvement in events ranging from Reagan's Nicaraguan Contra program (including direct involvement in the Iran-Contra scandal), to making the case for the Iraq War as a trusted friend of Bush and Cheney, to directing US-Saudi covert operations overseeing the arming of jihadists in Syria.

Middle East Eye issued the report based on multiple contacts "inside the royal court" and indicates further that the scale of MBS' aggressive crackdown is much larger than previously reported, and even involves the torture of "senior figures" among those detained…  And shockingly, those sources say that the longtime Saudi 'deep state' power broker and liaison with the West, Prince Bandar, is among the detained:

One of the most famous is Prince Bandar bin Sultan, a former Saudi ambassador to Washington and confidant of former US President George W Bush.  There is no word on his fate, but Saudi authorities said that one of the corruption cases they are looking at is the al-Yamamah arms deal, in which Bandar was involved.

While no doubt Bandar's very well-known role in Saudi "oil for arms" programs which have come to define Saudi relations with the West over the past decades is a trumped up and "selective" charge (insofar as the highest levels of the state have overseen such shady dealing) the al-Yamamah deal in particular - which goes back to the mid-1980's - has been an historical embarrassment to both the UK and Saudi governments (BAE Systems was the prime British contractor involved) for the astounding level of fraudulent accounting exposed in UK courts.

Concerning Prince Bandar's role in the al-Yamamah deal, Middle East Eye continues:

Bandar bought an entire village in the Cotswolds, a picturesque area of central England, and a 2,000-acre sporting estate with part of the proceeds from kickbacks he received in the al-Yamamah arms deal, which netted British manufacturer BAE £43bn ($56.5bn) in contracts for fighter aircraft.

 As much as $30m (£15m) is alleged to have been paid into Bandar’s dollar account at Riggs Bank in Washington and the affair led to corruption probes in the US and UK, although the case was dropped in the UK in 2006 after an intervention by then-prime minister Tony Blair.

But more likely is that Bandar has been caught up in this week's MBS dragnet for his closeness to Western heads of state and foreign intelligence services… Likely, Bandar has been detained to ensure a communications blackout with Western intelligence and media until MBS' plans are complete, with the added benefit of ensuring the "anti-corruption" angle to the purges for the consumption of international media.

Ironically, Bandar himself once seemed to publicly boast about receiving massive kickbacks in relation to Saudi weapons dealing, which perhaps further made him an easy and high profile target in this week's crackdown…

Weapons contracts have long been a source of wealth. British media reported that Prince Bandar received well over $1 billion in secret payments from BAE Systems, the leading British military contractor, over the course of a decade. The son of founding King Abdulaziz’s personal doctor, Adnan Khashoggi, became a billionaire as an arms dealer and go-between for weapons makers and members of the royal family.

Meanwhile news of Bandar's possible arrest and detention hasn't spread very widely in international media reports as of this writing, but it will be interesting to see the response in the West should the news be confirmed. Will Bandar's friends in Washington and London go to bat for him? Or will Prince Bandar quietly recede into the background of a permanent forced retirement from public life?

Most likely the latter will be the case. Regardless, for friends of the former powerful Saudi intelligence director on either side of the Atlantic and within Saudi Arabia itself, Bandar no doubt knows where all the skeletons are buried, and this alone makes him a worrisome, volatile and unpredictable figure in the midst of a transfer of power.

Hmm, interesting Jamal Khashoggi was a cousin to Bandar and was a reporter for the Washington Post, the CIA’s propaganda arm.  It was Bandar along with Tony Blair and W. Bush that sold the Iraq war to the people based on their lies and all three have gotten richer off the war.  Very interesting don’t you think?  Bandar Bush was identified in the secret 28 pages of the 911 report.  From Veterans Today:

Excerpt:

Bandar “Bush” Named as 9/11 Planner in 28 Pages

Editor’s note:  Prince Bandar, former head of Saudi secret services, former Ambassador to the United States, has been tied directly to the planning of 9/11.  Below, an excerpt in the widely censored release of the 28 long withheld pages, made a huge error.

In naming ASPCOL Corporation as handling the “property” of Prince Bandar, those who failed to redact this section did not note that attorney William Jordan III, the sole proprietor of ASPCOL Corporation, not only represents Bandar’s property interests but has broader involvements in arms sales and more, as outlined in the February 12, 2008 Aspen Daily News article included as Appendix I.

Seemingly, film maker Michael Moore had this right in Fahrenheit 9/11…

The declassified documents were released by Congress on Friday and released them the same day, release of the documents confirmed suspicions that the terrorists involved in the 9/11 attacks – most of whom were Saudi nationals –  likely received support from high-ranking Saudi intelligence officers.

“While in the United States, some of the September 11 hijackers were in contact with, and received support or assistance from, individuals who may have be connected to the Saudi Government,” the report states. “There is information, primarily from FBI sources, that at least two of those individuals were alleged by some to be Saudi intelligence officers.”

My, my, my thick as thieves.  Now America’s “intelligence agencies” are claiming the MBS ordered the hit on Khashoggi but can we believe anything that comes from these corrupt agencies?  President Trump is not caving to pressure to oust MBS, so I wonder what Trump knows, maybe the answer is in this article from State of the Nation:

Excerpt:

Here’s why Khashoggi was really killed and set up with a Turkish honeytrap


Jamal Khashoggi and Hatice Cengiz

Who is Hatice Cengiz?
Primary Reasons Why MbS Ordered Assassination:
(i) Khashoggi Developing Exposé on Use of Chemical Weapons in Yemen by Saudi Arabia
(ii) Khashoggi’s Integral Participation in Upcoming Coup Against the Saudi Crown Prince
(iii) Khashoggi contracted by Brennan’s rogue C.I.A. to blow up relationship between Trump and MbS.

It’s very important to note that no other assassination in recent history has received so much mainstream media (MSM) attention as the macabre killing of Jamal Khashoggi.  One would think that he was the JFK of Saudi Arabia from the nonstop, above-the-fold print reporting, especially from the American MSM.

There are very good reasons for this.  The entire assassination conspiracy was stealthily crafted by John Brennan’s rogue C.I.A.  Just like former CIA Director Allen Dulles literally commandeered the assassination plot of JFK in 1963 after he was fired by President Kennedy, it appears that Brennan oversaw this scheme to take out Khashoggi in the most crafty and dramatic way.

The Washington Post is a key cog in the CIA’s Mockingbird Media and, therefore, all of their reporters are either card-carrying CIA agents or covert contractors.  There’s no question that Khashoggi’s loyalties shifted majorly after he began writing for the WaPo in September of 2017.  That month marked the beginning of the end of Khashoggi.

The ongoing war between President Trump and the WaPo’s owner Jeff Bezos is well documented.  Bezos has always been a prime CIA asset (that’s why he was chosen to build and head Amazon.com) and he was recruited to purchase The Washington Post by his handlers.  The top spooks at Langley knew they could count on him to weaponize the premier newspaper of record whenever ordered to.  And so he has—BIG TIME!

With this critical understanding, it’s very easy to see how Khashoggi was used by the rogue C.I.A. to drive a massive wedge between Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman Al Saud.  MbS, as he is known, was an extremely vulnerable target for a WaPo investigative journalist, particularly one like Khashoggi who was a lifelong insider within the House of Saud.

Because Khashoggi was employed by the opposing Saudi factions at different times of his career, he was privy to everything—all the state secrets…and there are many.  As follows:

• Khashoggi was closely associated with “Prince Turki who was the director of the Mukhabarat, the Saudi state intelligence apparatus”.  It’s quite likely that whatever Prince Turki knew about the false flag terrorist attacks of 9/11 where it concerned the direct involvement of Saudi Arabia, so did Khashoggi.  TPTB could simply no longer trust him with that highly radioactive 9/11 information.

Ten days before the 9/11 terror attacks on New York City, in which some 3,000 Americans died, Prince Turki retired from his post as head of Saudi intelligence. It was an abrupt departure, well before his tenure was due to expire.

What does Turkey and the apparent honeypot have to do with all of this.

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was determined to pose a countervailing force to the Saudi juggernaut that started rolling across the Middle East with the blessing of their partner-in-war-crimes—Israel.  This highly aggressive military posture is unprecedented and was assumed by Saudi Arabia with the ascension of MsB and the forming of his close partnership with the Trump administration.

Erdoğan knew that he had to do something very radical or else his grandiose plans to form a 3rd Millennium Ottoman Caliphate would be doomed.  Hence, the evidence demonstrates that honeypot Hatice Cengiz was sent into Jamal’s life to entrap him in a scheme that would seal his fate, which it did. 

The whole story about “Khashoggi collecting divorce papers relating to his previous marriage” never made any sense.  Why Khashoggi would ever enter the Saudi consulate in Ankara is even a greater mystery, especially in light of his exceedingly dangerous position as potentially the greatest whistleblower OF ALL TIME (e.g. 9/11 truth)… 

That the entire conversation was recorded after Khashoggi entered the consulate is also quite suspect.  That’s because the entire assassination plot was implemented according to a carefully constructed plan.  The only one who didn’t know about it was Khashoggi.  Even Trump knew about the murder plot as Khashoggi was the most monitored man in the USA…in Turkey…and anywhere else he traveled to.

But why would President Trump permit a rogue CIA faction to pull off such a dastardly deed in broad daylight, especially one that would completely tear apart the US-Saudi relationship?  Trump is more concerned about the price of oil in 2018 and beyond than anything else on Earth.  His main promise and purpose is to MAGA, and he cannot do that with a skyrocketing or wildly fluctuating oil price.  Hence, this whole scheme could also be used by his administration to keep MsS on a very short leash.  Which it has done…

This high-profile assassination also allowed Turkey to re-assert itself onto the Mideast geopolitical chessboard in a HUGE way.  Turkey believes that the heinous assassination can forever be used as a cudgel to beat Saudi Arabia whenever it oversteps as it’s doing everyday under the tyrannical MbS…

Now that the C.I.A. has issued a report boldly incriminating MbS, anything goes.  This thing can explode into a clusterf*ck of incriminations and recrimination by all the concerned parties…and there are many.  Just sit back and watch the fireworks, as it’s going to get very interesting indeed.  TMR’s next report will cover the inevitable cataclysmic damage in the wake of this geopolitical superstorm.  It may also prove to be a perfect storm where it concerns the desperately needed revelation of 9/11 truth…

The real trifecta of treachery is the three B’s, Bush, Bandar and Blair unindicted war criminals.  It sounds like the election of Donald Trump was a HUGE reset on the world stage.  Trump’s relationship with MBS is going to be real interesting, especially because Trump doesn’t blindly trust the CIA or the Washington Post.   As is always with the case with war it’s all about the big banks and big oil.  From Mint Press:

Excerpt:

The Real Reason the Knives are Out for MBS


In the six weeks before Khashoggi’s disappearance, MBS not only managed to anger the U.S. military-industrial complex but the world’s most powerful bankers.  Thus, it seems that it was the privatization of Aramco that had MBS spooked.

Far beyond the cancellation of the IPO itself — MBS has endangered other parts of the plan that these powerful financial interests had been counting on for well over a year. That includes Vision 2030’s plan to increase the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) — which is managed by a group of HSBC and Bank of America directors and a CitiGroup investment banking alumnus — from its current $230 billion in assets to a massive $2 trillion.

The dramatic increase in the fund’s size would make the PIF the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world. Without that injection of cash into the PIF from the Aramco IPO, media reports have warned of a “ripple effect” on the U.S. economy, including massive U.S. tech companies like Uber, given that the PIF has invested heavily in such companies.

Evidence has since emerged that MBS knows that these powerful banks are still angry despite his efforts to placate them. On October 5, just a few days after Khashoggi’s murder, MBS promised a new Aramco IPO within a few years, this time valued at $2 trillion. However, media reports on that announcement made it clear that Goldman Sachs, CitiGroup and the like weren’t convinced.

Indeed, with the entire privatization effort now in doubt, so too is the estimated $6 trillion in direct investments from powerful interests that had been planned to fund the privatization schemes that comprise the entirety of Vision 2030. That figure could certainly explain why so much pressure has been levied against MBS as of late over Khashoggi.

Indeed, given that the Saudis had butchered another dissident writer in 1979 in their Lebanese consulate without the same outrage that has resulted from Khashoggi’s murder, it is safe to say that the establishment’s outrage over this latest extrajudicial killing is motivated less by “human rights” than by trillions of dollars of capital.

A 2016 report from Foreign Policy succinctly states why past Saudi Royals have avoided “free-market reforms” as the older generations of the House of Saud “understand the fragility of a monarchy whose brittle pillars rest on the quiescence of conservative clerics and a merchant class hostile to the free-market reforms that will undercut their privileges.”

However, far more Saudis than just the “merchant class” have grown accustomed to the largesse of the Saudi state, as the majority of Saudi citizens benefit from Saudi state spending in the form of fuel subsidies, loans, free land, and public-sector jobs, among other boons. Indeed, half of the entire Saudi population is currently on welfare — welfare that depends on the wealth of the Saudi state and its oil revenue — while two-thirds of Saudis work in the public sector.

Of course, sharing oil profits with robber barons — as would have been the case in the partial privatization of Saudi Aramco — would reduce the amount of money the Saudi government dedicates annually to welfare programs and public-sector jobs to a significant degree. Notably, Vision 2030 also included “austerity programs” as part of its implementation, including tax increases and a significant reduction in the fuel subsidies given to ordinary Saudis.

However, less than a week after a handful of those austerity measures were implemented earlier this year, the Saudi government quickly eased them by increasing state-job salaries and launching a new economic stimulus program, after a “very negative” public response.

Despite the government’s efforts to assuage the anger that austerity had caused, it was not enough and the outcry continued, forcing the Saudi government to fire the country’s water minister to absorb some of the outrage. The fierce public response seems to have given MBS his first real inkling that his “ambitious reforms” to privatize Saudi Arabia would not be so easy to implement, no matter how hard he had worked to crush dissent.

Another indication of why MBS backed out of privatization plans can be seen in what happened to other countries when their young princes, championed as “ambitious reformers,” had drunk the “McKinsey Kool-Aid.” As Salem Saif wrote at Jacobin, many of the Arab countries that had previously followed McKinsey-drafted plans for neoliberalization subsequently “became epicenters of the Arab Spring. Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, Yemen — each was convulsed by demonstrations, often animated by economic grievances.”

In contrast, Saudi Arabia, with its state-owned and state-managed assets, had remained largely immune to these economically-spurred uprisings throughout the Middle East. 

However, earlier this year, MBS learned the hard way from the hostile reception to his privatization rollout that being the West’s neoliberal darling comes at a high price, one that could imperil not just his position as Crown Prince but the entire Saudi government.

The search begins for a new prince who will play along

As a consequence of the Khashoggi incident, there have been several reports from prominent publications claiming that efforts are now underway to replace MBS as crown prince. One such report in France’s Le Figaro has stated that MBS is set to be “gradually” replaced by his even younger brother Khalid bin Salman, who has most recently served as the Saudi Ambassador to Washington.

This choice is significant, as it shows that the powers-that-be are seeking to replace MBS with another McKinsey-bent “young Arab princeling” instead of the former Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef or another elder of the House of Saud who would oppose the privatization that MBS had promised but failed to deliver…

Beyond his stated views in support of current Saudi policy, including the genocidal war the Saudis are waging in Yemen, not much else is known about Khalid, who has little political experience given his young age and his time spent as a fighter pilot in the Royal Saudi Air Force.

Yet, in his capacity as Saudi ambassador, Khalid bin Salman has met with powerful Congressmen from both parties, as well as Lockheed Martin executives, cultivating personal ties in the process…

Yet, what is clear is that MBS’ rise to power was backed by the international elite and the Trump administration based on the promise of these neoliberal reforms and the mass sale of U.S. weapons to Saudi Arabia.

So Washington is threatening to oust MBS and install a puppet to enforce neoliberal policies like they have in Greece, you know austerity programs.  HSBC and the greedy big banks want their snouts in the Saudi trough.  They want the Saudi people to suffer like the people are suffering in America and in Britain.  Well Philip Giraldi at Lew Rockwell has the right idea:

Excerpt:

The Only Regime Change that Is Needed Is in Washington

Ambassador James Jeffrey Nut of the Month

One of the things to look forward to in the upcoming holiday season is the special treats that one is allowed to sample. Fruitcake and nuts are Thanksgiving and Christmas favorites. They usually come in tins or special packages but it seems that this season some of the nuts have escaped and have fled to obtain sanctuary from the Trump Administration.

Currently, there is certainly a wide range of nuts available on display in the West Wing. There is the delicate but hairy Bolton, which has recently received the coveted “Defender of Israel” award, and also the robust Pompeo, courageously bucking the trend to overeat during the holidays by telling the Iranian people that they should either surrender or starve to death. And then there is the always popular Haley, voting audaciously to give part of Syria to Israel as a holiday treat.

But my vote for the most magnificent nut in an Administration that is overflowing with such talent would be the esteemed United States Special Representative for Syria Engagement James Jeffrey.

The accolade is in part due to the fact that Jeffrey started out relatively sane as a career diplomat with the State Department, holding ambassadorships in Iraq, Turkey, and Albania. He had to work hard to become as demented as he now is but was helped along the way by signing on as a visiting fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), which is a spin-off of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

Jeffrey set the tone for his term of office shortly after being appointed back in August when he argued that the Syrian terrorists were “. . . not terrorists, but people fighting a civil war against a brutal dictator. Jeffrey, who must have somehow missed a lot of the head chopping and rape going on, subsequently traveled to the Middle East and stopped off in Israel to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It has been suggested that Jeffrey received his marching orders during the visit.

James Jeffrey has been particularly active during this past month.  On November 7th he declared that he would like to see Russia maintain a “permissive approach” to allowing the Israelis to attack Iranian targets inside Syria.  Regarding Iran’s possible future role in Syria, he observed that “Iranians are part of the problem not part of the solution…”
As virtually no one but Jeffrey and the Israeli government actually believes that Damascus and Tehran were responsible for creating ISIS, the ambassador elaborated, blaming President Bashar al-Assad for the cycle of violence in Syria that, he claimed, allowed the development of the terrorist group in both Syria and neighboring Iraq…

Jeffrey’s formula is just another recycling of the myth that the Syrian opposition consisted of good folks who wanted to establish democracy in the country. In reality, it incorporated terrorist elements right from the beginning and groups like ISIS and the al-Qaeda affiliates rapidly assumed control of the violence. That Jeffrey should be so ignorant or blinded by his own presumptions to be unaware of that is astonishing.

It is also interesting to note that he makes no mention of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, knee-jerk support for Israel and the unrelenting pressure on Syria starting with the Syrian Accountability Act of 2003 and continuing with the embrace of the so-called Arab Spring. Most observers believe that those actions were major contributors to the rise of ISIS.

Jeffrey’s unflinching embrace of the Israeli and hardline Washington assessment of the Syrian crisis comes as no surprise given his pedigree, but in the same interview where he pounded Iran and Syria, he asserted oddly that “We’re not about regime change. We’re about a change in the behavior of a government and of a state.”

Actually, the only regime change that is needed is in Washington and it would include Jeffrey, Bolton, Haley, Pompeo, and Miller. And while we’re at it, get rid of son-in-law Jared Kushner and his claque of Orthodox Jews, Jason Greenblatt the “peace negotiator” and David Friedman the U.S. Ambassador in Israel. None of them are capable of acting to advance any American national interest, which they wouldn’t recognize even if it hit them in the butt…

Regime change in America cannot come too soon how this cabal managed to take over the Trump Administration is a mystery.  The mess they made in Ukraine is now reaching a melting point with the corrupt American installed, Petro Poroshenko trying to start a war with Russia.  From RT:

Excerpt:

US, Europe & NATO risk all-out war by backing unhinged Kiev regime

Arguably, the Kiev regime and its adulation of World War II Nazi collaborators never had any legitimacy in the first place. It continues to demonstrate its lack of legitimacy from the immense social problems in Ukraine of poverty, corruption, human rights violations, neo-Nazi paramilitaries running amok, and now martial law being imposed.

It remains to be seen if the recent naval provocation was carried out with the tacit approval of Washington and other NATO powers as a pretext for further militarization against Russia. The initial misplaced condemnations of Russia have subsided to more measured calls from US President Donald Trump and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian for “restraint” and “dialogue.”

That might suggest Kiev’s failing President Poroshenko and his security services acted alone to order the naval confrontation as a desperate throw of the dice to escalate NATO and EU support for his shaky regime against Russia.

Trump’s comments hoping that Kiev and Russia would “straighten things out” sound like Washington is not behind the provocation and has no desire for a wider conflict. Just as well, because such a development is a gateway to all-out war.

Nevertheless, such a catastrophe is always a serious risk when Western powers indulge this unhinged Kiev regime.

Amen, just another US installed unhinged regime.  None of this would have happened were it not for the decision by five corrupt Supreme Court Justices overturning the American election results in 2000 and installing George W. Bush as president.  So Justice Roberts, your claims are pure horseshit. 

 “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them. That independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for.”

Were Bush not installed in 2000 by five corrupt judges you would not be on that corrupt court.  If Al Gore were allowed to take office after the American people voted him in as president in 2000 there would have been no 911 attack.  The Gore Commission had released a report after two years of study while he was Vice President identifying terrorism as America’s biggest threat, particularly the threat of an airliner being hijacked and used as a bomb.  Gore had a list of recommendations one being securing the cockpit doors,  

The Republicans in congress laughed at Gore and refused to fund the Gore recommendations to protect America from the exact kind of attack that took place 9 months after Bush took office.  Bush and Cheney tore up the Gore Commission report saying the biggest threat to America was Saddam Hussein. 

So call him Mr. Obvious, as the corrupt media clamors for Trump to condemn MBS, and screams that Putin is attacking Ukraine, and calls for regime change in Syria, Trump tells truth.  The more Trump tell the truth the louder the media screams.   When Harry Truman was on the campaign trail and someone yelled “Give them hell Harry” them being Republicans.  Truman’s reply was “I never did give them hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.”  So give them hell Trump, keep telling the truth.


Friday, November 16, 2018

Which country’s interests do the Deep State’s foreign policy serve, certainly not America’s



Quotes by Contemporary Experts on the USS Liberty


A number of Johnson administration, military, and intelligence community officials – all of whom had access to classified materials regarding the attack – have commented on the conclusions they reached concerning the attack…

Members of Congress

Craig Hosmer, then-U.S. Representative:

"Whatever the reason for the attack, it was an act of high piracy. Those responsible should be court-martialed on charges of murder, amongst other counts. The Israel Government should pay full reparations to the United States and indemnities to the families of the Americans killed." —Craig Hosmer, then-U.S. Representative, on the floor of the House of Representatives, 29 June 1967

*Adlai Stevenson III, former United States Senator:

"Those sailors who were wounded, who were eyewitnesses, have not been heard from by the American public. . . [Their story] leaves no doubt but what this was a premeditated, carefully reconnoitered attack by Israeli aircraft against our ship." —US Senator Adlai Stevenson III in interview with Wm. J. Small, UPI, for publication September 28, 1980

James Abourezk, former United States Senator

"The shame of the U.S.S. Liberty incident is that our sailors were treated as though they were enemies, rather than the patriots and heroes that they were. There is no other incident--beyond Israeli attack on the U.S.S. Liberty--that shows the power of the Israeli Lobby by being able to silence successive American governments. Allowing the lies told by the Israelis and their minions in the U.S. is disheartening to all of us who are proud of our servicemen." —James Abourezk, United States Senate, 1973-79

*Paul Findley, former U.S. Congressman:

"Certain facts are clear. The attack was no accident. The Liberty was assaulted in broad daylight by Israeli forces who knew the ship's identity. ...THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES LED A COVER-UP so thorough that years after he left office, the episode was still largely unknown to the public -- and the men who suffered and died have gone largely unhonored." —Paul Findley, They Dare to Speak Out, Lawrence Hill & Co., 1985, p166
Military Officials

Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, US Navy (Ret.):

“The ship was clearly identified, not only by its unique configuration but by a very large U.S. flag that was flown at the time. The weather was calm and the visibility was excellent. During this unprovoked attack 34 U.S. Navy men were killed and 171 wounded.

Nevertheless, to this day the American public does not know why the attack took place and who was involved overall. “In my opinion, the United States government and the Israeli government must share responsibility for this cover-up.

Commander William McGonagle, Captain, USS Liberty:

After more than two hours of unremitting assault, the Israelis finally halted their attack. One of the torpedo boats approached the Liberty. This same torpedo boat crew had been circling the ship, machine-gunning anyone who stuck his head above decks, AS WELL AS THE LIFEBOATS THE CREW HAD PUT OVER THE SIDE.

What had changed? The Israeli government knew that US aircraft carriers had just launched aircraft to come to Liberty's aid AND THE ATTACK WAS QUICKLY CALLED OFF. The Israeli government called the US Embassy and said that they had made a "mistake."

A torpedo boat officer asked in English over a bullhorn: "Do you need any help?"

The wounded commander of the Liberty, Captain William McGonagle, instructed the quartermaster to respond emphatically: "FUCK YOU."


America’s midterm election results are in and it has been decided, warmongering Zionist Republicans and warmongering Zionist Democrats have won.  If Nancy Pelosi returns as the Speaker of the House, it is assured nothing will change.  Pelosi has already vowed to work with Republicans when it comes to continuing America’s trillion dollar Israeli directed foreign policy. 

However Pelosi sternly threatened that in areas where they do not agree, i.e. domestic policy, she will fight hard for incremental, meaningless changes.  The election is a joke because there is no opposition party.  Any time a progressive populist manages to win an election in spite of the Democratic establishment’s road blocks, the elitists vote for the same old, tired, bought off leadership that have controlled the party for the last 35 years.  The Democratic voters have no say.

On the contrary, Republicans rotate younger members with absolute unwavering loyalty to the GOP’s Zionist agenda into leadership positions giving a false face of change.  All the while, the American people have zero, zip, nada to say about the agenda that will be smashed down upon their heads.   From Russia Insider:

Excerpt:

Israel Wins the Midterms
No matter who is elected Israel comes first

Judging from the mainstream media, Israel was not a major issue in the midterm election but it sure did come up a lot when candidates for office were wooing Jewish or Evangelical voters.

To cite only one example, Florida Congressman Ron DeSantis criticized his opponent Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum during their gubernatorial race for receiving support from the Dream Defenders, a group favoring Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel, and giving a speech welcoming members of the Council on American-Islamic Relations to his city.   

DeSantis claimed in a video clip that “I can find anti-Semites around him, but it’s almost like ‘we don’t want to discuss that.’”  DeSantis, who sponsored the 2013 Palestinian Accountability Act which called for the withholding of U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority until it recognizes Israel as a Jewish state, charged that Gillum would not be a “friend” of Israel…

DeSantis boasted about his presence in Jerusalem when the U.S. Embassy was moved to that city in May and has promised as governor to visit Israel’s illegal settlements on the West Bank, which he refers to by the preferred Israeli usage as “Judea and Samaria.” He threatens critics that “If you boycott Israel, the state of Florida will boycott you.”

One might note at a minimum that for Ron DeSantis and ambitious slimeballs like him it is all about Israel due to their own political self-interest, with nothing actually in the mix for either Florida or the United States. The uninformed public buys into the narrative because it doesn’t know any better thanks to the media’s heavy slant in favor of Israel, allowing uncritical support for the Jewish state to continue under the radar unchallenged.

DeSantis, a former U.S. Navy lawyer, has demonstrated that he reveres Israel even more than his former comrades in arms. In his congressional district there are a number of survivors of the U.S.S. Liberty, which was attacked in international waters by Israel on June 8, 1967, killing 34 crewmen and injuring 171 more. They report that DeSantis has been completely unsympathetic to their requests that a commission of inquiry finally be convened to determine what actually happened on that day.

In fact, Americans have never had the option of voting on the “special relationship” that Israel enjoys with the United States as no Congressman would dare run against it lest they be smeared in the media and find themselves running against an extraordinarily well funded opponent benefitting from large donations coming from out of state sources.

The list of prominent politicians “taken down” by Israel is lengthy, and includes Cynthia McKinney, *Adlai Stevenson III, *Paul Findley, Chuck Percy, William Fulbright, Roger Jepsen, and Pete McCloskey.

It is particularly ironic that as the midterm campaigns were drawing to a close there appeared some serious investigative journalism that demonstrates precisely how Israel and Jewish groups corrupt the political process in America to provide virtually unlimited support for anything and everything that the despicable Benjamin Netanyahu and his gang of war criminals seek to do.

 How the process has succeeded is best illustrated by the current Israeli government’s policy of “mowing the grass” in Gaza where it is using army snipers to kill unarmed Palestinian protesters. Washington not only does not protest against the in-your-face war crime, it aids and abets it with U.S. Ambassador David Friedman justifying the military response as measured and appropriate…

To be sure, the groundbreaking book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy by professors Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, which appeared in 2007, pulled no punches in describing how the Israel Lobby operates in the United States. It also made clear that the relationship with Israel serves no United States national interest whatsoever and exists solely because of the corruption of the political system and the media by principally Jewish individuals and groups that are dedicated to that task…

That’s right the American people have never had a vote as to whether they want to continue a special relationship with Israel, a relationship the serves no national interest whatsoever.  The American people have never been given the facts that surround the deliberate cover-up of the murderous attack on the U.S.S. Liberty. 

The American government is rife with politicians whose first loyalty is to Israel and it has cost the American people dearly, last count around $21 trillion.  Any politician who dares to question that relationship is as good as dead.  It seems the only occupant of the current political world with the courage and will to stand up to the Israeli stranglehold on our government is First Lady Melania Trump.  From Ron Paul Institute:

Excerpt:

Melania Trump Kneecaps Top Bolton Aide

Hooray for First Lady Melania Trump! In a refreshingly - and shockingly - frank statement, the relatively quiet First Lady has issued a statement through her spokeswoman today making it clear that top National Security Council aide Mira Ricardel needs to hit the bricks.

Ricardel, Deputy National Security Adviser under John Bolton, is said to have "berated people in meetings, yelled at professional staff, argued with the first lady and spread rumors about [Defense Secretary] Mattis." But denying NSC resources to the First Lady in support of Melania Trump's recent trip to Africa may have been the last straw. That and her tussling with the First Lady's staff over seating assignments on the Africa-bound plane.

According to, Stephanie Grisham, the First Lady's spokeswoman, "It is the position of the Office of the First Lady that she no longer deserves the honor of serving in this White House."

In the Kremlinology of White House power watching, what is most interesting about this dust-up is that Ricardel is firmly in the Bolton wing and has repeatedly clashed with White House Chief of Staff Kelly and Defense Secretary Mattis.

While it is currently unclear whether Ricardel has actually been fired, the reported move by the First Lady marks her most public foray into personnel issues. Is the First Lady looking out for President Trump's flank as second-tier neocon attack dogs nip at his ankles? We can only hope so!

What does that mean for the NSC's top dog? Might the days of John "Regime Change" Bolton be numbered as President Trump's National Security Advisor? We can only hope!  Last month Bolton's chief of staff, Fred Fleitz, unexpectedly resigned his position after just a couple of months on the job. Bolton has described Fleitz as "a longtime friend and adviser." Adding that, "he's been a valuable member of the National Security Council team."

Fleitz claimed that he decided to ditch his powerful position at the right hand of National Security Advisor Bolton because he was promised the top job at the relatively minor neoconservative think tank, Center for Security Policy. Insiders claim Fleitz's hardline neoconservative views, particularly his previously stated position that Islamic Sharia was "creeping" worldwide, had been a political liability to the White House.

Why the move on Ricardel by Melania? The First Lady only became a permanent US resident two years after the neocons pushed President Clinton into an unprovoked attack on her native former Yugoslavia. Is it possible the quiet Melania has retained memories of what monsters they are and is now determined to rid the Trump Administration of those scheming murderers? We shouldn't slip too deeply into this fantasy, but if that is your intent, Madame First Lady, please allow us to provide you with our top ten pink slip recommendations...

Bravo our wonderful First Lady, you are truly a magnificent asset to your husband, our President Donald Trump.  The daggers pointed at your husband are long and dangerous.  Those around him are traitors of the worst kind, they have no loyalty to America or Americans.  Their awards are not American awards but awards for betraying America.  From Global Research:

Excerpt:

John Bolton Wins “Defender of Israel” Award From Zionist Lobby Group That Helped Appoint Him

The ZOA, Bolton’s enthusiastic sponsor, led the campaign to remove former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster from his post after railing against McMaster’s “anti-Israel” positions, most notably his support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), better known as the Iran nuclear deal.

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) recently awarded U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton the “Defender of Israel Award” during its annual awards dinner, which took place in New York on Sunday night…

Though Bolton has received several awards from the Israel lobby in the past, due to his fervent promotion of Zionism and Israeli government policy, this more recent award is notable, as the ZOA is largely responsible for Bolton’s appointment as National Security Adviser within the Trump administration…

However, McMaster had also earned the ire of American Zionists for allegedly referring to Israel as an “occupying power” and acknowledging the existence of Palestine — as Zionists at ZOA and like-minded organizations support a revisionist history of the creation of the Israeli state that asserts that Palestine as a state never existed prior to Israel’s establishment in 1948.

Bolton’s Past Advocacy for Israel at US Expense Heralds Dangerous New Era in Geopolitics

Leaked emails reported on by MintPress earlier this year revealed that ZOA’s campaign to remove McMaster soon won the support of Trump’s top political donor, Zionist billionaire Sheldon Adelson. It was later revealed that Adelson had been instrumental in placing Bolton in the position McMaster vacated, as Bolton had long been a confidant of the politically influential casino magnate and Adelson had previously lobbied Trump – then president-elect – to include Bolton in his cabinet.

President Trump vowed to usher in an America First agenda when he campaigned for president.  Trump’s initial cabinet members such as McMaster and Tillerson showed a real commitment to that end.   The Republican and Democratic elites couldn’t allow that to stand so they launched the Mueller Investigation to disrupt the Trump presidency.  Make no mistake, those strings were pulled by the Israeli lobby.  From Mint Press:

Excerpt:

Now Biggest Donor in all of US Politics, Sheldon Adelson Brings an Israel First Agenda to Washington

Adelson’s massive expenditures in federal elections this cycle are being made because he believes that Republican control of the House and the Senate is vital to maintaining right-wing and pro-Zionist policies and his influence in Washington and at the White House.

WASHINGTON – According to publicly available campaign finance data, Sheldon Adelson – the conservative, Zionist, casino billionaire –is now the biggest spender on federal elections in all of American politics. Adelson, who was the top donor to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and the Republican Party in 2016, has cemented his role as the top political donor in the country after giving $55 million in recent months to Republicans in an effort to help the party keep its majority in both houses of Congress.

Adelson’s willingness to help the GOP stay in power is likely born out of his desire to protect the massive investment he placed in the party last election cycle. In 2016, the Republican mega-donor gave heavily to the Trump campaign and Republicans, donating $35 million to the former and $55 million to the top two Republican Super PACs — the Congressional Leadership Fund and the Senate Leadership Fund — during that election cycle.

Adelson’s decision to again donate tens of millions of dollars to Republican efforts to stay in power is a direct consequence of how successfully Adelson has been able to influence U.S. policy since Trump and the GOP rode to victory in the last election cycle.

A New York Times article on Adelson, titled “Sheldon Adelson Sees a Lot to Like in Trump’s Washington,” notes that Adelson “enjoys a direct line to the president.” Furthermore, Adelson and Trump regularly meet once a month “in private in-person meetings and phone conversations” that Adelson has used to push major changes to U.S. policy that Trump has made reality — such as moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and cutting aid to Palestinian refugees, among others…

The fact that Adelson is “pleased-as-punch” with Trump’s performance as president should hardly come as a surprise, given that the president has fulfilled his campaign promises that were of prime importance to Adelson, while many of his other campaign promises – namely those that were populist or anti-war in nature – have rung hollow…

As previously mentioned, The New York Times recently noted that the cutting of aid to Palestinians, the U.S.’ removal from JCPOA, and the Jerusalem embassy move all resulted from private in-person meetings and phone conversations between Adelson and Trump.

Adelson has also been successful in stocking the Trump administration with politicians he has long supported as well as his confidantes. Adelson-supported appointees include Nikki Haley, long-time recipient of Adelson campaign funds who now serves as U.S. ambassador to the UN; Mike Pompeo, former CIA director who has advocated for bombing Iran and now serves as secretary of state; and John Bolton, a close confidante of Adelson, who is now national security adviser.

Adelson was also instrumental in removing Pompeo and Bolton’s predecessors, Rex Tillerson and H.R. McMaster, from their respective posts, owing to their support for JCPOA and their alleged “anti-Israel” positions. Speculation has recently grown that Secretary of Defense James Mattis may share their fate for similarly opposing Adelson’s positions.

Yet, upon closer examination, these Adelson-driven personnel and policy moves enacted by Trump seem to merely be the foundation for the so-called “Adelson agenda,” a set of convergent goals that could potentially result in thousands of deaths in the Middle East and embroil the U.S. in yet another regime-change war.

While Adelson’s top-donor status has allowed him unprecedented access to the Trump administration and has resulted in dramatic changes to U.S. policy, there is every indication that the worst is yet to come…

As an example, during the negotiations that eventually led to the Iran nuclear deal, Adelson publicly advocated for a U.S. nuclear attack on Iran without provocation, so the U.S. could “impose its demands [on Iran] from a position of strength.”

More specifically, Adelson’s “negotiation” plan involved the U.S. dropping a nuclear bomb in the middle of the Iranian desert and then threatening to drop “the next one […] in the middle of Tehran” to show that “we mean business.” Tehran, Iran’s capital, is home to nearly 9 million people with 15 million more in its suburbs. Were Tehran to be attacked with nuclear weapons, an estimated 7 million would die within moments…

With the Trump administration now applying “maximum pressure” to Iran, Adelson’s vision for engaging the Islamic Republic is of critical importance. For instance, if this “maximum pressure” campaign — currently a combination of draconian sanctions, bullying Iran’s trading partners, and covert CIA-driven regime-change operations — ultimately fails, Adelson is likely to push Trump towards more drastic “negotiation” tactics in order to force Iran into a “new treaty” designed by and for pro-Israel interests that seek to eliminate Iran as a regional player…

Beyond the fact that Adelson’s unprecedented influence on U.S. politics is set to create much more instability than past policies he has promoted, lies another unsettling truth: for less than $150 million — pocket change for such a plutocrat Adelson has effectively bought the presidency and Congress…

Indeed, crossing Adelson — as shown by the high-profile firings of McMaster and Tillerson — has its steep price, and obeying Adelson now seems to be the most essential step that Trump and other Republicans must follow to stay in power.

AMERICANS, MEET YOUR NEW, UNELECTED OVERLORD — Sheldon Adelson — because, as long as the U.S. political system is “hostage to his fortune,” he’s not going anywhere.

“Americans, meet your new unelected overlord” indeed.  Sadly there was great hope in America when Donald Trump and his “Make America Great Again” agenda went to Washington.  Trump has been hijacked by the Adelson coalition in congress and if he dares to veer from the Adelson agenda, the Mueller investigation will be used to remove him from power.  Adelson’s agenda includes undoing the very basic tenants in place from the beginning of this nation.  From Strategic Culture:

Excerpt:

US Threatens Pullout from UPU and ITU, Which Survived Hitler but Not Trump

The United States is threatening to withdraw from two international organizations that survived World Wars I and II but may not survive the retrogressive neo-conservative foreign policy of Donald Trump. The world’s third-oldest international organization, the Universal Postal Union (UPU), founded in 1874 in Bern, Switzerland, has been informed by Washington of the US withdrawal. The United States became, under the administration of President Ulysses Grant, a founding member of the UPU.

The Trump administration, notably the rabidly-rightwing White House trade adviser, Peter Navarro, is upset over foreign government subsidies for certain postal authorities, most notably that of China, which reduces international parcel mailing costs to manufacturers and consumers. Rather than negotiate revised postal rates, through the auspices of the UPU, which was established to standardize the world’s postal system, Trump plans to leave the organization.

The Trump White House is also threatening US withdrawal from the second-oldest international organization, the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), established by the International Telegraph Convention in Paris in 1865. The United States joined the ITU in 1908, during the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt. The two presidents – Grant and Roosevelt – who ushered the United States into the UPU and ITU, respectively, were Republicans.

Trump’s beef with the ITU is over the organization’s management of the international radio frequency spectrum and its movement toward managing international data bandwidth. Trump’s Federal Communications Commission (FCC) members, notably FCC chairman Ajit Pai and member Michael O’Rielly, both of whom are owned and operated by America’s communications giants -- including AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast -- who want private industry, not government agencies, to set the rules for radio spectrum and bandwidth governance…

The candidate dropped for RRB chair was board vice-chair Joanne Wilson, nominated by Barack Obama in 2014 to the board’s second-ranking position…

The Trump administration has threatened to cut off funding of the ITU, a move tantamount to withdrawal, unless the ITU selects Doreen Bogdan-Martin, a favorite of the scandal-ridden US Commerce Secretary, Wilbur Ross, to be the next BDT director…  Bogdan-Martin… had the backing of the George W. Bush administration for various positions at the ITU…

The UPU's main responsibility is to set standards for electronic data interchange (EDI), mail encoding, postal forms, international reply coupons, international postal money orders, and meters between postal authorities. It also strives to ensure that member states adhere to uniform flat rates for mailing letters to any location around the world…

The UPU also sets regulations for the sending of biologically perishable materials via international post and the handling of both hazardous materials and disease-bearing items that could pose a danger to postal workers…

The Trump administration also announced the US withdrawal from UNESCO, EFFECTIVE DECEMBER 31, 2018. The United States maintains the horrible distinction of being the only UPU member where the postal system was used, during the George W. Bush administration, to distribute a biological warfare agent – anthrax.

The consequences of US withdrawal from the UPU will be felt immediately. According to UPU deputy director-general Pascal Clivaz, upon termination of American membership in the treaty, Americans will no longer be able to send or receive letters or packages to and from UPU member states, including Canada and Mexico.

The UPU will no longer share special codes with the US Postal Service (USPS) that are necessary to send and receive international mail. The only mechanism to send and receive international mail will be via more expensive private delivery services, such as FedEx and UPS.

Although belligerent nations in World War II conducted extensive wiretapping of international telegraph and telephone lines and radio connections, phone calls and telegrams could still be sent between major world capitals because the ITU’s standards continued to be maintained. Seamless digital communications may no longer be the case if the Trump administration, unlike Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, or Imperial Japan, abandons the ITU and its radio frequency management and standards criteria.

The UPU and ITU survived Adolf Hitler, but not Donald Trump. That is a legacy for which every American should feel nothing but shame and everlasting remorse.

There are winners and losers for every decision the U.S. President makes.  Seems to me the big losers in Trump pulling out of the UPU effective December 31 will be the American people.  The huge winners will be FedEx and UPS who will be able to charge anything they want to ship outside the US because there will be no alternatives available.  Postal workers will only be able to accommodate domestic mail services resulting in massive layoffs and loss of jobs, jobs, jobs. 

Is that what Americans voted for when they elected Donald Trump?  Did Americans vote for an even more bloated military budget and cuts to Social Security and Medicare?  From Rolling Stone:

Excerpt:

Trump’s Defense Spending Is Out of Control, and Poised to Get Worse

Using a time-honored trick, a bipartisan congressional panel argues we should boost the president’s record defense bill even more

A bipartisan commission has determined that President Trump’s recent record defense bill is insufficiently massive to keep America safe, and we should spend more, while cutting “entitlements.”

The National Defense Strategy Commission concluded the Department of Defense was too focused on “efficiency” and needed to accept “greater cost and risk” to search for “leap-ahead technologies” to help the U.S. maintain superiority.

The panel added that Defense is “not where most of the money is.” It said Congress should be focused on “domestic entitlement programs” and “interest payments on the national debt” as sources of savings…  The report even contains a graph that shows defense spending crawling sadly along the floor of the spending X-axis as mighty mandatory “entitlements” soar to great heights.

This is the same Department of Defense with a serious existing accounting problem. In 2016, before Trump was elected, its Inspector General said he could not properly track $6.5 trillion in defense spending. A later academic study claimed the number was $21 trillion, looking at the years 1998-2015.

Trump originally asked for over $730 billion in defense spending for Fiscal Year 2019, and last spring a budget setting spending at $716 billion passed 85-10 in the Senate. This would have meant an $82 billion spending hike, an increase that by itself was larger than the entire defense budget of every country on earth, save China.

Trump later called for an across-the-board budget cut of 5 percent, leaving the amount of the defense budget in confusion. He still claims he wants $700 billion. Whatever the final amount turns out to be, it will be massive — about 10 times the size of Russia’s defense budget, and four times the size of China’s.

The National Defense Strategy Commission was created as part of the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act. It’s section 942 in this bill, and it requires that the majority and minority committee chiefs for Armed Services in both the House and the Senate to each name three people to the panel.

Eric Edelman, who was the senior policy official in the Defense Department from 2005-2009, chairs the panel. The co-chair, appointed by Democrat Adam Smith of Washington, is Admiral Gary Roughead, who was named chief of Naval operations in 2007 and now sits on the board of Northrup Grumman…

To recap: While spending record sums on a defense bill, Congress allocated still more money to a panel of current and former defense specialists whose purpose seems to have been to write a report asking for more money… 

 We regularly hear that our weapons systems are old, outdated and placing troops in harm’s way. It’s an ancient political device and it usually works…  This appeal to national consumerist shame — we can’t be seen in public driving something old! ­— is effective. On a policy level, such appeals are usually couched in terms of needing to make American “hard power” a more “credible” foreign policy tool…

So instead of looking honestly at where we do and do not need to spend, the military mostly looks at existing weapons systems — even ones that work pretty well — and focuses on how long it’s been since we unveiled jazzy re-designs. That allows the endless cycle of patronage and political contributions to stay in place.

This is why we continue to spend on projects like the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, an infamous boondoggle that projects to cost over a trillion dollars over the life of the program. Even our president could see through it, once. Shortly after his election, Trump blasted the F-35 program as “out of control” and promised to save “billions” on it.

Then Trump met with Lockheed Martin chief executive Marilyn Hewson, and the president appeared to warm to the F-35. Among other things, he seems to believe “stealth” means the plane is literally invisible:

TRUMP: We buy billions and billions dollars worth of that beautiful F-35. It’s stealth, you cannot see it. Is that correct?

HEWSON: That’s correct, Mr. President.

Before long, Trump was speaking of the weapon in almost erotic, Conan The Barbarian-esque tones:

Now when our enemies hear the F-35’s engines, when they’re roaring overhead, their souls will tremble and they will know the day of reckoning has arrived.

Politicians inevitably fall in love with weapons and weapons-makers. They tend to have less interaction with the people we’re blowing up overseas, or with those who just want us to spend relatively more on schools and medicine. The Pentagon has a powerful lobby; the anti-Pentagon, not so much.

Along with jet fighters, the U.S. is spending a fortune trying to upgrade its aircraft carrier fleet. Trump is adding ships like the unfortunately named U.S.S. Gerald Ford.  According to the Project on Government Oversight, the Ford now projects to cost $12.9 billion, or about 25 percent above original estimates.

Moreover, because it is replacing the proven technology of “steam catapults” with a new, glitchy “digital catapult,” it may take a while before the Ford class even matches the capability of the existing Nimitz carriers.

The Pentagon doesn’t just spend money; it spends a lot of money asking for more money. And it has many friends in politics and the media to help them along. Its people may not be great at preparing for the next war, but, they know how to keep their budgets high, and they’re at it again.

The more things change the more they stay the same.  It didn’t take long for Trump to abandon his campaign promises of jobs, jobs, jobs.  Now the midterm election results are mostly in and we are in the “rubber hits the road” portion of the election where the two parties undo the election results through leadership assignments.  From OpEd News:

Excerpt:

The "Pelosi Problem" Runs Deep

Nancy Pelosi will probably be the next House speaker, a prospect that fills most alert progressives with disquiet, if not dread. But instead of fixating on her as a villain, progressives should recognize the long-standing House Democratic leader as a symptom of a calcified party hierarchy that has worn out its grassroots welcome and is beginning to lose its grip.

Increasingly at odds with the Democratic Party's mobilized base, that grip has held on with gobs of money from centralized, deep-pocket sources -- endlessly reinforcing continual deference to corporate power and an ongoing embrace of massively profitable militarism.

Pelosi has earned a reputation as an excellent manager, and she has certainly managed to keep herself in power atop Democrats in the House. She's a deft expert on how Congress works, but she seems out of touch -- intentionally or not -- with the millions of grassroots progressives who are fed up with her kind of leadership.

Those progressives should not reconcile with Pelosi, any more than they should demonize her… There is much to counter at the top of the party. Pelosi still refuses to support single-payer enhanced "Medicare for all."

As on many other issues, she -- and others, such as the more corporate-friendly House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer -- are clinging to timeworn, Wall Street-friendly positions against powerful political winds generated by years of grassroots activism.

Increasingly, such leadership is isolated from the party it claims to lead. Yet the progressive base is having more and more impact. As a Vox headline proclaimed, more than a year ago, "The stunning Democratic shift on single-payer: In 2008, no leading Democratic presidential candidate backed single-payer. In 2020, all of them might." The Medicare for All Caucus now lists 76 House members.

Any progressive should emphatically reject Pelosi's current embrace of a "pay-go" rule that would straitjacket spending for new social programs by requiring offset tax hikes or budget cuts.

Her position is even more outrageous in view of her fervent support for astronomical military spending. Like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (who was just re-elected to his post), Pelosi went out of her way last winter to proclaim avid support for President Trump's major increase in the already-bloated Pentagon budget, boasting: "In our negotiations, congressional Democrats have been fighting for increases in funding for defense."

Whether our concerns involve militarism, social equity, economic justice, civil liberties, climate change or the overarching necessity of a Green New Deal, the Democratic Party must change from the bottom up…

During the Obama years, by deferring to top-tier party leaders, many in the Progressive Caucus showed themselves to be unreliable advocates for progressive causes when push came to shove -- during the 2009 health care debate, for example…


While the governing body of the party, the Democratic National Committee, gave ground this year on such matters as internal party democracy (disempowering superdelegates in the process), senior Democrats have retained a firm hold on such powerful mechanisms as the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC)…

Yeah, so much for the progressive movement in the Democratic Party.  There will be no change, there will be no justice for the Americans murdered, maimed and brutalized aboard the U.S.S. Liberty.  America’s midterm election results are in and it has been decided, warmongering Zionist Republicans and warmongering Zionist Democrats have won. 

Pelosi will return as Speaker to continue the work of Paul Ryan and the corporatist agenda.  Pelosi isn’t the only slap in the face of the Democrats who voted for a change, there’s the Senate minority leader too.  From TheIntercept:

Excerpt:

Chuck Schumer Caved to Facebook and Donald Trump. He Shouldn’t Lead Senate Democrats.

IT WASN’T Donald Trump who said he opposed the nuclear deal with Iran because “we will be worse off with this agreement than without it,” while lying about the contents of that deal.

It wasn’t Mike Pence who said that “since the Palestinians in Gaza elected Hamas … to strangle them economically until they see that’s not the way to go makes sense.”

It wasn’t John Bolton who voted for the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2002, saying that Saddam Hussein was engaged in a “vigorous pursuit of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons.”

It wasn’t Mike Pompeo who said, “It’s easy to sit back in the armchair and say that torture can never be used. But when you’re in the foxhole, it’s a very different deal.”

It wasn’t Stephen Miller who responded to the 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris by suggesting “a pause may be necessary” in the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the United States.

It wasn’t Betsy DeVos who joined a group of finance industry executives for breakfast only a few weeks after the 2008 financial crash and told them, “We are not going to be a bunch of crazy, anti-business liberals.”

Forget the hawks, blowhards, and kakistocrats of the Trump administration. You know who made all these statements? It was Chuck Schumer.

Yes, the fourth-term Democratic senator from New York has a long history of making really right-wing and rancid remarks. Yet on Wednesday morning, Schumer was re-elected as minority leader by acclamation in a closed-door meeting of Senate Democrats. They didn’t even bother to vote on it.

By Wednesday evening, though, the New York Times had published a blockbuster investigation into Facebook, which reminded us how Schumer, in the words of my colleague Glenn Greenwald, “has long been the embodiment of everything sleazy, legally corrupt, corporatist and craven in Washington.”

What did the Times say about the newly re-elected Senate minority leader?

In at least one instance, the company also relied on Mr. Schumer, the New York senator and Senate Democratic leader. He has long worked to advance Silicon Valley’s interests on issues such as commercial drone regulations and patent reform. During the 2016 election cycle, he raised more money from Facebook employees than any other member of Congress, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Mr. Schumer also has a personal connection to Facebook: His daughter Alison joined the firm out of college and is now a marketing manager in Facebook’s New York office, according to her LinkedIn profile.

In July, as Facebook’s troubles threatened to cost the company billions of dollars in market value, Mr. Schumer confronted [Sen. Mark] Warner, by then Facebook’s most insistent inquisitor in Congress.  Back off, he told Mr. Warner, according to a Facebook employee briefed on Mr. Schumer’s intervention. Mr. Warner should be looking for ways to work with Facebook, Mr. Schumer advised, not harm it. Facebook lobbyists were kept abreast of Mr. Schumer’s efforts to protect the company, according to the employee.

To be clear: The leader of the Senate Democrats tried to bully a fellow Democratic senator to “back off” from investigating a company where his daughter works and which gives him more money than any other member of Congress. Why isn’t this a bigger story? How is this not a resigning issue?

Remember, there are, as of right now, 47 elected Senate Democrats. Almost any of them — with the glaring exception of the pretend-Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia — would do a better job of leading the party than Schumer.

As I argued earlier this week, the next two years in U.S. politics will be a 24/7 battle for the future of American democracy; a relentless fight against fascism, racism, and white nationalism. Are we really expected to believe that Schumer will be the leader of the #Resistance in the Senate ? Don’t make me laugh…

In February 2018, Trump signed off “on the biggest budget the Pentagon has ever seen: $700 billion.” Schumer’s response? “We fully support President Trump’s Defense Department’s request,” his office announced.

In May 2018, Trump moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, in defiance of the international community. Schumer’s response? “In a long overdue move, we have moved our embassy to Jerusalem,” he declared, adding: “I applaud President Trump for doing it.”

In August 2018, prior to the Supreme Court confirmation hearings, Trump nominated a bunch of new judges to fill vacancies in a number of federal district courts. Schumer’s response? As Vox reported, the Senate minority leader “reached an agreement late Tuesday with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to fast-track the confirmations of 15 Trump-nominated judicial picks...”

Man, I think I’m going to be sick.  What Pelosi and Schumer and their cadre of dinosaurs fail to understand is that the Democrats won in spite of them, not because of them.  They are despicable and don’t’ deserve the support of any Democrats.

Which country’s interests do the Deep State’s foreign policy serve, certainly not America’s.  The only thing that can change the status quo would be an educated, activated electorate, or perhaps a quiet, genteel First Lady with the ear of the President to steer the country into a new direction.  Let’s hope Melania wins out and the President truly drains this putrid, bi-partisan swamp.