[FOX] The man who says he acted as a "go-between" last year to inform Sen. John McCain about the controversial "dossier" containing salacious allegations about then-candidate Donald Trump is speaking out, revealing how the ex-British spy who researched the document helped coordinate its release to the FBI, the media and Capitol Hill.
"My mission was essentially to be a go-between and a messenger, to tell the senator and assistants that such a dossier existed," Sir Andrew Wood told Fox News in an exclusive interview with senior executive producer Pamela K. Browne.
Fox News spoke to Wood at the 2017 Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia, Canada. As Britain’s ambassador to Moscow from 1995-2000, Wood witnessed the end of Russian President Boris Yeltsin and the rise of Vladimir Putin.
Just after the U.S. presidential election in November 2016, Arizona GOP Sen. McCain spoke at the same security conference. Wood says he was instructed ‐ by former British spy Christopher Steele ‐ to reach out to the senior Republican, whom Wood called "a good man," about the unverified document.
#4
McCain took the bait;
and now we have Collusiongate.
Thanks John. Your pettiness is exceeded only by your, well, I cant't think of anything just yet -
I doubt your grand-kids will be attending any dedication ceremonies at Statuary Hall.
BLUF:
[Denver Post 7 Dec 2017 update] When the FBI began investigating whether Clinton improperly used a private server to send classified emails, it interviewed Platte River’s employees, who were also subpoenaed by the congressional committee. At that point, Platte’s response said they were cooperating with the FBI.
But the committee’s work was not done. In Thursday’s letter to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, who chairs the House Committee on Science, Space & Technology, said Suazo failed to produce documents, made false statements and obstructed the committee’s investigation. The committee wants the case to go before a grand jury.
"Instead of cooperation, the Committee was met with obstruction and refusal to comply with subpoenas and requests for transcribed interviews. These actions, taken together, as well as Mr. Suazo’s false statements to the Committee, made through counsel, support the pattern of obstruction. If left unaddressed, Mr. Suazo’s conduct in ignoring lawful congressional subpoenas, misleading the Committee through false statements, and bald refusal to respond to reasonable requests could gravely impair Congress’s ability to exercise its core constitutional authorities of oversight and legislation," reads the letter, signed by Smith.
#3
I hate to say this but from his inaction as A/G or indicates that he has been compromised in the past. I would imagine that every congressperson has something in the closet waiting to be exposed.
Kind of like reading Joseph Conrad’s novel, Lord Jim.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/13/2017 10:13 Comments ||
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Can we now start rounding up Trump's political enemies, putting them in work camps and systematically starving everyone that isn't in the official party elite?
No?
Then maybe we can just execute Rodman with a AAA gun?
No?
Well shit... guess we have our answer if they are the same.
[DailyMail] Astronomers are set to scan an 'alien' comet for signs of extraterrestrial technology. Hormidos!!
The cigar-shaped asteroid, named 'Oumuamua by its discoverers, sailed past Earth last month and is the first interstellar object seen in the solar system.
A team of alien-hunting scientists, led by Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, will scan the comet this week before it sails beyond the reach of Earth's telescopes. Didn't like what they saw?
They say they are looking for radio signals, claiming the mysterious visitor could be an alien spaceship.
Astronomers have begun scanning an 'alien' comet for signs of extraterrestrial technology. Researchers say they are looking for radio signals, claiming the mysterious visitor could be an alien spaceship.
A cigar-shaped comet named 'Oumuamua sailed past Earth last month and is the first interstellar object seen in the solar system.
It was first spotted by a telescope in Hawaii on 18 October, and was observed 34 separate times in the following week.
Travelling at 44 kilometres per second (27 miles per second), the comet is headed away from the Earth and Sun on its way out of the solar system.
The comet is up to one-quarter mile (400 meters) long and highly-elongated - perhaps 10 times as long as it is wide.
That aspect ratio is greater than that of any asteroid or comet observed in our solar system to date.
But the comet's slightly red hue ‐ specifically pale pink ‐ and varying brightness are remarkably similar to objects in our own solar system.
The alien-hunting project will use the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia for its investigation, with the campaign set to begin at 3:00pm ET (8:00pm GMT) on Wednesday.
The telescopes sensitive equipment would would take less than a minute to pick up something as faint as the radio waves from a smartphone, according to the Atlantic.
Milner, the business mogul behind Breakthrough Listen, a $100 million (£75m) search for intelligent extraterrestrial life, received an email about the object last week from one of his chief scientists.
'The more I study this object, the more unusual it appears, making me wonder whether it might be an artificially made probe which was sent by an alien civilisation,' Professor Avi Loeb, the chair of Harvard's astronomy department and one of Milner's advisers on Breakthrough Listen, wrote in the email.
Professor Loeb said the space rock's peculiar elongated shape is odd for a common space rock but ideal for a ship flying between star systems.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
12/13/2017 00:00 ||
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#1
Good, private sector.
Our tax funded, gov audited, lifer admins managed crack NEO monitoring team didn’t notice until it passed.
#2
I suspect that if this is an interstellar alien spacecraft or probe, from a civilization advanced enough to produce it, then they would probably be somewhat beyond 'radio' for communications.
Quantum Entangled Particle or Superluminal communication concepts (both theoretical and both having constraints, based on what we know), or something else entirely, might be utilized.
Still, keep listening.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
12/13/2017 7:40 Comments ||
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#10
Even at speeds exceeding the speed of light, the object, if intelligent in origin, is several million years old and most likely the civilization of origin has moved on or expired.
Space is vast and the distances are almost beyond comprehension. If a civilization were scanning our planet, they would be seeing dinosaurs not cities.
#15
If I were an Alien, My space ship would not look like a rock; it would be the cover feature for the forthcoming issue of
'Better Homes and Hangars.'
#16
If it is as old as I think it is, the erosion from space dust would change it from a sparkling example of home world technology into a corroded eroded thing such as we have here.
As for exceeding the speed of light? Heck I don't know, I just know that once you get to about 0.9C things get very weird and beyond that it is all theoretical...go read Einstein he might illuminate you.
I was just saying the nearest likely suspects for intelligent life are so far away this thing if intelligent in origin is extremely old (see dinosaurs).
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/13/2017 18:11 Comments ||
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#25
With all the stupid sitcoms and broadcasts and news we spew out in to space every day we better hope no spacefaring race finds us and decides the've had enough of our crap...
#27
I would not be surprised if extrasolar objects pass through the solar system fairly frequ3ntly, our not seeing them is a function of not looking in the right place and most times they are passing a lot farther out. But if this object is artificial it sure is an instellar slowpoke
#28
Long ago I read of plans for hollowing out an asteroid to make an interstellar spacecraft. The idea would be the rock itself could provide a lot of protection from space debris and radiation.
The reach of Sultan Erdogan Recep Tayyip I, the much beloved, is long, and his hatred for his former BFF is without bounds.
[ToloNews] Students from an Afghan-Turk school in Kabul claim that security forces raided the school and entered girls’ hostel on Tuesday evening.
The National Directorate of Security ...the Afghan national intel agency... operatives detained four teachers today (Tuesday) morning, who were on their way to an Afghan-Turk high school. We were informed that they were kidnapped. We thought the country’s enemies may have kidnapped them, but later we found out that the officers of the National Directorate Security have detained them," said Yusuf Pashtun, member of the Afghan-Turk students’ parents association.
"How they (security forces) entered a civilian compound and the girls’ hostel while they did not have any order from the court? This is illegal," Sediqullah Tawhidi, another member of the association, said.
Hours after the incident, the Afghan-Turk High School, without pointing out to the security forces’ raid on the school, in a statement said four teachers of the school, including three Ottoman Turkish and one Afghan nationals, are missing.
The statement said the teachers were on their way to Afghan-Turk High School in Shah-e-Do Shamshira area, in the center of Kabul City, and then they were disappeared.
The raid comes after months of deliberations over closure of several Afghan-Turk schools that Ankara believes are run by pro-Gulen institutions.
A former Afghan security official who wished not to be named said he believed the teachers might be extradited to The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... even though the two countries have no extradition agreement.
The incident came hours after Afghanistan's Caped PresidentAshraf Ghani ...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. .. left for Istanbul, Turkey, to attend the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Summit.
Following an unsuccessful cope last year, the Ottoman Turkish government asked Kabul to handover the leadership of Afghan-Turk schools to government of Turkey.
Ottoman Turkish government claims that these schools are led by Fethullah Gülen ... a Turkish preacher living in Pennsylvania whom the current govt of Turkey considers responsible for all the ills afflicting Turkey and possibly the entire world... , who the Ottoman Turkish government says was behind the military cope.
Officials of Afghan-Turk schools and students’ families however have rejected these claims.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/13/2017 00:00 ||
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[VOANews] TOKYO ‐ A U.S. soldier who deserted to North Korea more than half a century ago, but who was eventually allowed to leave the secretive state, has died in Japan aged 77.
One of the Cold War's strangest dramas began in 1965 when Charles Robert Jenkins, then a 24-year-old army sergeant nicknamed "Scooter" from tiny Rich Square in North Carolina, disappeared one January night while on patrol near the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas.
At an emotional court martial in Japan in 2004, Jenkins - who had never gone to high school - said he deserted to avoid hazardous duty in South Korea and escape combat in Vietnam.
"It was Christmas time, it was also cold and dark. I started to drink alcohol. I never had drunk so much alcohol," he said in a thick Southern accent, choking back sobs.
He drank 10 beers, took his men on patrol and told them to wait while he checked the road below. He then walked towards North Korea, holding a rifle with a white t-shirt tied around it. He said he had planned to go to Russia and turn himself in, and had not expected North Korea to keep him.
While in North Korea, where he taught English to soldiers and portrayed an evil U.S. spy in a propaganda film, Jenkins met and married Hitomi Soga, a Japanese woman 20 years his junior who had been kidnapped by North Korea to help train spies.
Fear for his safety and the family he built with Soga made it impossible to refuse any demands made on him, Jenkins said.
"You don't say no to North Korea. You say one thing bad about Kim Il-sung and then you dig your own hole, because you're gone," Jenkins told his court martial, referring to the founder of the secretive state.
Soga was allowed to return to Japan in 2002 and Jenkins followed with their two North Korean-born daughters in 2004.
After serving a token 30-day sentence for desertion, Jenkins moved with his family to Sado, Soga's rural hometown, late in 2004. He subsequently worked in a gift shop and wrote a book about his experiences in North Korea.
A Sado town official confirmed his death, but could give no further details. I resisted the temptation to append something snarky. His afterlife burden should be enough.
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy ||
12/13/2017 00:00 ||
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#2
Trying to avoid the Viet Nam war, he spent over half a century in Hell, during which time he no doubt repented heartily his youthful idiocy — the more so, once he had the safety of a wife and daughters to consider.
And in Japan, the life of those who are not pure Japanese is generally challenging. Those poor girls.
[BBC] A video showing a man hacking another man to death and setting him alight spread across India's social networks a week ago, sparking shock and outrage. BBC Hindi's Dilnawaz Pasha visited Rajasmand, the town where the crime occurred, to find out what motivated it.
"We have nothing to say. Everybody has seen what has happened," says one man, pale-faced and teary-eyed.
He doesn't want to be named. He is still reeling from the fact his relative, Shambu Lal, has been arrested as the alleged attacker in the gruesome video.
The three-minute clip shows a man screaming and crying for help as he is repeatedly struck with a pick axe, until he dies. The attacker then sets the body on fire, saying it was a "warning" to Muslims, India's largest religious minority.
Soon after I entered Rajasmand in the western state of Rajasthan, I realised that everyone there knew about the video. I was told that even children had watched it.
The attacker made someone film the crime on a phone and then posted the video on Facebook. The police later identified him as Shambu Lal, a Hindu marble trader who is also a Dalit (formerly known as untouchable).
The victim was Mohammad Afrajul, a Muslim migrant labourer who had been living in Rajasthan for more than a decade.
The video, which was aired on some television channels and shared across social media - has stunned India. The crime itself is distressingly familiar - there have been numerous instances in the past few years of Muslims being brutally and publicly killed.
Mr Lal confessed to the murder in a note, a photo of which he also posted on Facebook. His accompanying message, and other videos shared by him, suggest the attack was motivated by religion.
In the video, Mr Lal warns Muslims, saying: "This is what will happen to you if you do 'love jihad' in our country."
The term "love jihad" has been popularised by radical Hindu fringe groups, who accuse Muslim men of participating in a conspiracy to turn Hindu women from their religion by seducing them.
In a second video, Mr Lal is seen justifying the attack to "protect the honour of Hindus against Muslims".
Many of those who know Mr Lal spoke on condition of anonymity and described him as a man who was "soft-spoken" and "concerned" for others.
But some also said they had been worried about him in the weeks leading up to the crime.
Mr Lal's business had been struggling and he had been spending a lot of time watching videos on his phone - videos on Facebook or WhatsApp that, they believe, may have motivated his actions.
WhatsApp, through which videos can travel fast and wide, has been often used to spread rumours and whip up hysteria in India. Earlier this year, messages on WhatsApp led to mobs in eastern India beating seven people to death in two separate incidents after mistaking them for child traffickers.
Most of India's fake news spreads via WhatsApp and mobile phone messages because phones are the first point of exposure to the internet for a majority of Indians.
When I spoke with a group of young Dalit men who knew Mr Lal, it became apparent that spurious news clips and videos about alleged cases of "love-jihad" were being widely circulated among younger Hindu men.
One of them pulled out his phone to show me a local news story he had received on WhatsApp, which claimed that a Hindu girl had been kidnapped and raped by Muslim men. The story he showed me has not been verified or reported by any of India's established media organisations.
"What Shambu has done is absolutely right," he says. "This is what needs to be done to stop love jihad."
Another young man agreed: "When we see such news, it fills us with rage. Why are Muslims taking our girls? Why are they raping them and forcing them to convert to Islam? Tell me, who will accept this?"
This group of men has created a WhatsApp group where they praise Mr Lal, and also share photos of him stamped with Hindu right-wing slogans. A photo of his, for instance, was accompanied with the message, "love jihadis, be alert, Shambu has risen."
#1
The crime itself is distressingly familiar - there have been numerous instances in the past few years of Muslims being brutally and publicly killed.
So, if I'm tired of reading everyday about Muslims brutally killing people, and want to see the opposite, I've to look at Indian newspapers?
#5
I don’t know about India, but it is a common — and commonly documented — story in Egypt. Although sometimes the girls fell in love with the boys, no kidnap wih rape required.
[DAWN] Two persons were killed and five, including one woman, injured in an incident of firing in the Baghdadi area in Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... 's Lyari ...one of the eighteen constituent towns of the city of Karachi. It is the smallest town by area in the city but also the most densely populated. Lyari has few schools, substandard hospitals, a poor water system, limited infrastructure, and broken roads. It is a stronghold of ruling Pakistan Peoples Party. Ubiquitous gang activity and a thriving narcotics industry make Lyari one of the most disturbed places in Karachi, which is really saying a lot.... on Tuesday evening, Senior Superintendent Police (SSP) Adeel Hussain Chandio informed Dawn.
Local builder Rozie Khan Niazi's son, Raees Niazi, was at a hotel in Kalri when two gunnies, Mubeen and Fazal Dad, opened fire on him after his refusal to pay them bhatta (protection money), SSP Chandio said.
Four passersby also suffered gunshot wounds. The injured have been shifted to Civil Hospital, police said.
As Raees succumbed to his wounds, an outraged mob overwhelmed and killed Fazal Dad and injured Mubeen, the police officer added.
SSP Chandio stated that the attackers were from the Raja Pathan gang. Fazal's brother, Mustufa, had been killed last year in a police encounter. Deputy Inspector General Azad Khan said Raees had played a role in Mustufa's killing.
Inspector General Sindh A.D. Khowaja and Home Minister Sohail Anwar Siyal have taken notice of the incident. Directives have been issued for the timely arrest of all involved in the incident.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2017 00:00 ||
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[TheHill] Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) on Monday went after President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, biking to the French capital's city hall to discuss the issue with the mayor.
Photos and videos posted online show Schwarzenegger waving and grinning as he rides on a green bike, wearing a green tie.
The action star spoke at an event focused on climate change that was hosted by R20, a nonprofit he co-founded.
"It doesn’t matter that Donald Trump backed out of the Paris agreement, because the private sector didn’t drop out, the public sector didn’t drop out, the universities didn’t drop out, the scientists didn’t drop out, the engineers didn’t drop out.... No one else dropped out," Schwarzenegger said, according to The Los Angeles Times.
Which is as it should be. President Trump’s point is that it is not the job of the federal government to waste taxpayer money on such things. Everyone else is free to waste their money as they — and in the case of sub-federal government entities, as their voters’ elected representatives — please.
Trump in June announced that the United States would withdraw from the Paris climate accord, calling the agreement "unfair at the highest level." The decision placed the U.S. at odds with the rest of the world ‐ every other country on Earth has signed onto the deal.
Yes, however in science it isn’t the consensus that wins, but the one individual who is more right than everyone else.
Schwarzenegger has emerged as a prominent voice on the subject of climate change Penance for boinking the housekeeper?
In 2011 he founded R-20, an international organization with backing from the United Nations that works to fund green infrastructure efforts. Mr. Schwarzenneger may be contacted HERE.
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy ||
12/13/2017 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[FOX] The man who says he acted as a "go-between" last year to inform Sen. John McCain about the controversial "dossier" containing salacious allegations about then-candidate Donald Trump is speaking out, revealing how the ex-British spy who researched the document helped coordinate its release to the FBI, the media and Capitol Hill.
...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. ..
... a Turkish preacher living in Pennsylvania whom the current govt of Turkey considers responsible for all the ills afflicting Turkey and possibly the entire world...
