The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. – Benjamin Franklin
– Putin Makes Obama an Offer He Can’t Refuse:
Why is John Kerry so eager to convene an emergency summit on Syria now when the war has been dragging on for four and a half years?
Is he worried that Russia’s air campaign is wiping out too many US-backed jihadis and sabotaging Washington’s plan to topple Syrian President Bashar al Assad?
And …
– The US Spends $35 Billion In Global Economic Aid (But Where Does All This Money Really Go?):
The United States provided approximately $35 billion in economic aid to over 140 countries in fiscal year 2014.
In the HowMuch.net-created map below, the relative size of each country is proportionate to the aid received from the United States and the color of each country indicates GDP per capita.
Clearly, not all aid is distributed equally. The question is: Who received the largest slice of the pie from the U.S.? From the map above, the answer is clear: Israel.
Read moreThe US Spends $35 Billion In Global Economic Aid (But Where Does All This Money Really Go?)
H/t reader squodgy:
“Being on the other side of the world, this issue is small fry, but I was making a ‘contact us’ call the other day & asked my helper where he was.“The Philippines” was his response.I sighed, but it made a change from Mumbai & Delhi.So I asked him about the pressure I believed they were under to allow the USA back in for military bases.It seems they want them back desperately to fend off Chinese expansionism all around the area, even though the multiple typhoon hits linked to HAARP have forced them to embrace familiar US support. Messy. Devious & typically American “John Perkins” syndrome.
– Arbitration panel OKs jurisdiction in South China Sea case:
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — An international tribunal ruled Thursday that it can take on a case between China and the Philippines over disputed territory in the South China Sea, overruling objections from Beijing that the arbitration body has no authority to hear the case.
The Philippine case, which was filed before the tribunal in The Hague in January 2013, contends that China’s massive territorial claims in the strategic waters do not conform with the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea and should be declared invalid. The Philippines also asserts that some Chinese-occupied reefs and shoals do not generate, or create a claim to, territorial waters.
Read moreArbitration panel OKs jurisdiction in South China Sea case
– Bombshell! Europe Drops Charges Against Edward Snowden, Offers Asylum And Protection:
This week, the European Parliament voted to offer Edward Snowden asylum and protection and drop all criminal charges against him. When at one time most of the world was bullied by the US government into pressing charges against Snowden and forcing him into exile, the entire European continent has now officially given him a pass.
Thursday’s 285 – 281 vote officially recognized Snowden as an “international human rights defender” and ensured that he would be free from arrest within European borders.
Read moreEurope Drops Charges Against Edward Snowden, Offers Asylum And Protection
Update:
– Syria: Obama authorizes boots on ground to fight ISIS (CNN)
– Obama Set To Announce US Boots On The Ground In Syria, Russia Threatens Deployment “Unacceptable”:
When the US media began airing helmet cam footage of Delta Force executing a prison break at an ISIS compound last week we suggested that Washington was making an effort to prepare the American public for more boots on the ground in Iraq and the possibility of ground troops in Syria.
The catalyst: Russia and Iran. Put simply, the US has been embarrassed by Moscow and Tehran’s coordinated effort to rout the Sunni extremists backed by Riyadh, Doha, and Ankara operating in Iraq and Syria and now, as Baghdad and Kabul threaten to turn to The Kremlin for help in the face of American ineptitude, the Pentagon is desperate to show that the US can still be effective at fighting terrorism.
– NOAA Refuses to Hand Over Climate Change Documents to Congress:
Last summer, scientists published a study that challenged the notion that global warming has been slowing down in recent years. Their analysis was based on temperature data that was provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Since that time, Congressman Lamar Smith has asked NOAA for the data and internal communications that were related to the study, but they have refused to hand them over.
On October 13th, Smith filed a subpoena for the documents. The Congressman has long been skeptical of climate change, and has accused NOAA of fabricating temperature data. Smith told The Examiner that “Congress cannot do its job when agencies openly defy Congress and refuse to turn over information…When an agency decides to alter the way it has analyzed historical temperature data for the past few decades, it’s crucial to understand on what basis those decisions were made. This action has broad national and policy implications.”
Read moreNOAA Refuses to Hand Over Climate Change Documents to Congress
– Shell Scraps Oil-Sands Project, Points at Big Issue For Canada:
On October 27, the Anglo-Dutch oil major announced that it was pulling the plug on its Carmon Creek oil sands project in Alberta, Canada. The project was expected to yield 80,000 barrels per day in oil sands production, which was originally greenlighted in 2013.
However, the markets have turned against Shell. In March, the company said that it would alter the design of the project to “take advantage of the market downturn to optimize design and retender certain contracts.” The logic was that low oil prices are forcing cost reductions up and down the supply chain, potentially allowing the company to lower construction costs.
Read moreShell Scraps Oil-Sands Project, Points at Big Issue For Canada
– Dramatic Footage From The Syrian War In Aleppo And Palmyra:
Back in May, ISIS seized the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, a UNESCO world heritage site.
The world immediately began to panic at the prospect of the city’s destruction at the hands of Islamic State. Since then, there have been various reports which indicate ISIS has in fact decimated a few treasures of antiquity and indeed, some of that destruction reportedly involved tying prisoners to ancient columns and then subsequently blowing them up (that “intelligence” comes from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights so one should take it with a grain of salt).
(an image purporting to show the destruction of ancient ruins)
Palmyra is but one key city the Assad regime and its Russian and Iranian allies are attempting to retake. Others include Aleppo, where Hezbollah and IRGC forces are fighting under cover of Moscow’s warplanes to wrest control from a hodgepodge of rebels and militants.
Read moreDramatic Footage From The Syrian War In Aleppo And Palmyra
“I cannot condemn in strong enough terms this ill-advised US military escalation in the Middle East. Whoever concluded that it is a good idea to send US troops into an area already being bombed by Russian military forces should really be relieved of duty.”
– We Must Oppose Obama’s Escalation in Syria and Iraq!:
By Ron Paul
Ealier this week, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee to outline a new US military strategy for the Middle East. The Secretary admitted the failure of the US “train and equip” program for rebels in Syria, but instead of taking the appropriate lessons from that failure and get out of the “regime change” business, he announced the opposite. The US would not only escalate its “train and equip” program by removing the requirement that fighters be vetted for extremist ideology, but according to the Secretary the US military would for the first time become directly and overtly involved in combat in Syria and Iraq.
Read moreRon Paul: “We Must Oppose Obama’s Escalation in Syria and Iraq!”
– Venezuela Sells Billions In Gold To Repay Its Debt:
Just under a year ago in the aftermath of the “OPEC Thanksgiving Massacre” of 2014 which sent oil crashing when Saudi Arabia effectively ended the oil cartel, we predicted that Venezuela (with its CDS trading at 2300 bps back then) would become the first casualty of the “crude carnage.” Since then not only has Venezuela, which relies on crude oil for 95% of its export revenue, suffered a dramatic episode of hyperinflation (which is only accelerating) coupled with total economic collapse, but its CDS has, as expected, blown out to reflect a default of probability at 96% over the next five years as shown below.
Yet while everyone promptly jumped on the “Venezuela will default bandwagon” it has so far avoided bankruptcy.
How can this country with a massive debt load and a paralyzed economy have avoided default so far?
– Retirement Assets of 100 CEOs Equals Combined Retirement Assets of 41% of American Families:
The following speaks for itself.
From Fortune:
The retirement assets of 100 Fortune 500 CEOs are worth more than the entire nest eggs of 41% of American families, a new study shows.
That means the 100 largest CEO retirement accounts—which totaled $4.9 billion last year—would equal the total saved by 50 million U.S. families, according to a report that was jointly published by the Institute for Policy Studies and the Center for Effective Government.
Now here’s the truly egregious part of all this…
Read moreRetirement Assets of 100 CEOs Equals Combined Retirement Assets of 41% of American Families
– Deutsche Bank Reports Massive Loss, Will Cut 35,000 Jobs, Exit 10 Countries In Sweeping Overhaul:
As we put it a few days ago while mocking Saudi Arabia’s attitude toward “collateral damage” from its bombing runs in Yemen, “you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.” Well, over at Deutsche Bank, John Cryan has been busy crushing whole cartons worth.
From sweeping job cuts, to reorganizations, to eliminating the dividend, Cryan has been a veritable wrecking ball since taking the helm from co-CEOs Anshu Jain (who is gone) and Jürgen Fitschen (who is leaving).
Just yesterday, Europe’s largest bank announced that the dividend would be scrapped as part of “Strategy 2020.” Here are some other key points from Cryan’s “plan”:
From the article:
“NATO military planning generates confrontational approaches to security issues that in our view should belong to the past. The creeping increase in NATO’s military presence on our frontiers [is] testing [our] patience.”
– NATO Looks To Station Thousands Of Troops On Border With Russia:
Russia’s dramatic intervention in Syria has served to push the conflict in Ukraine (a country that is now partially governed by Star Wars characters) to the back of the world’s collective mind. After all, separatists exchanging fire with government forces and/or far-right “volunteer” battalions every couple of days against a dreary backdrop of rundown Eastern European towns isn’t nearly as exciting as Sukhois dropping bombs on sword-waving desert bandits and so, Ukraine’s crisis has gradually receded into the background.
That said, it’s important to remember that one of the principal reasons for deteriorating relations between Moscow and the West is the conflict in Ukraine.
Read moreNATO Looks To Station Thousands Of Troops On Border With Russia
– The Oligarch Recovery – U.S. Military Veterans are Selling Their Pensions in Order to Pay the Bills:
Moore soon found himself two months behind on rent and at least 10 days from payday. In bed that night, he saw a TV ad for Future Income Payments, a company based in Irvine, Calif., that buys pensions in exchange for a lump sum. The company said it had worked with military personnel and government workers. Ten minutes later, he got up and made the call.
The next day, a company representative called Moore back and explained that he would receive a $5,000 cash advance for selling part of his pension. In exchange, Moore would have to pay the company $510 a month for five years — a total of $30,600.
If it were a typical loan, that would amount to $25,600 in interest — a rate of 512 percent.
– Putin urges dollar to be ditched in oil deals:
President Vladimir Putin has raised the ante in Russia’s bid to cut dependence on the dollar, urging greater use of the national currency, the ruble, in oil deals.
Russian leaders, whose country is a top crude exporter, have already proposed to carry out oil trade operations in currencies other than the dollar, such as China’s yuan.
school district north of San Francisco has decided to implement a new “grading system” that almost entirely negates the point of, well, grading systems.
Via The Daily Caller:
Under a new policy, students will be able to earn passing grades with scores of just 20 percent — and a solid C for doing absolutely nothing at all…
FYI (or better … FYD .. For Your Disinformation).
– Why some scientists are worried about a surprisingly cold ‘blob’ in the North Atlantic Ocean
This surely will end ‘well’!
– The BoJ Owns 52% Of The Entire Japanese ETF Market , And Now It Wants More:
Haruhiko Kuroda owns 52% of all Japanese ETFs. And now he wants more. Facing a lack of willing JGB sellers, the BoJ now faces the possibility that ramping up its easing efforts will entail expanding the bank’s already elephantine equity portfolio. “At a fundamental level, I don’t support the idea of central banks buying ETFs or equities. Unlike bonds, equities never redeem. That means they will have to be sold at some point, which creates market risk.”
…
FYI.
– IDF to impose separation of Jews, Palestinians in Gush Etzion:
Soldiers to keep Palestinians at physical distance from the Jewish population following military assessment that attacks in the West Bank’s Gush Etzion area will continue.
…
– Young unarmed man murdered in cold blood in Hebron:
Wednesday 28th at 3.25pm a young Palestinian was shot in cold blood in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood in Hebron. Human rights observers from International Solidarity Movement witnessed the young man being murdered while walking in the street near the Gilbert Ceckpoint.
The eyewitness from ISM, identified as Orion, states: “I am 100% sure he was unarmed. I saw the two soldiers creeping slowly along the road outside our apartment window with their guns cocked, so I looked down the street to see why. I saw an unarmed man walking normally towards the soldiers and suddenly they shot.”
– Huge problems with Taiwanese AH-64E fleet:
The Republic of China Army Aviation (RoCAA; Taiwan) has extreme difficulties keeping its 29 new AH-64E Apache Guardian attack helicopters airborne. Part of the problem is a discovered material failure due to faulty production by Boeing.
…
– BofA Looks At Europe’s Record €2.6 Trillion In Negative-Yielding Debt, Is Shocked At What It Finds:
…
BofA concludes:
For now, negative rates as a policy tool remain a “work in progress”, judging by the current inflation levels across Europe. But the rise in household savings rates amid so much central bank support is paradoxical to us, and mimics what we highlighted in the credit market earlier this year. Companies in Europe are deleveraging, not releveraging, and are buying back bonds not stock.
– Austria Runs Out Of ‘Long Guns’ As Europeans Scramble For Protection Against “Islamic Invasion”:
After decades of berating Americans for their Constitutionally protected right to bear arms, Europeans are finally starting to wake up. As SHTFPlan.com’s Mac Slavo notes, it took over a million Islamic immigrants and violence across their union to convince them, but it appears that they finally get it.
In Austria, the scramble for self defense firearms is on, as WND.com reports, Austrians are arming themselves at record rates in an effort to defend their households against feared attacks from Muslim invaders.
– Record Gun Sales in Austria as Refugee Crisis Accelerates:
Most Americans like to believe that the citizens of Europe have been completely disarmed by their governments, but that’s only partially true. Gun rights vary considerably from nation to nation, and guns can still be had, even in places with strict laws. However, a very interesting trend has emerged in those places.
Despite how hard it is to attain these weapons in countries like Austria, firearms are currently being sold there in record numbers much like they are in the United States. But instead of the threat of confiscation, this trend is being fueled by the refugee crisis. According to a Czech TV report, pretty much all of the long guns in the country have been sold out for the past three weeks. One gun merchant revealed that most of the buyers are women who want to protect themselves, and those who can’t buy firearms are buying up pepper spray.
Read moreRecord Gun Sales in Austria as Refugee Crisis Accelerates