Brought to you by…
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Lord Fanamort
Associates: We empower corrupt autocrats, because it pays a lot you
guys.
21:43
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Hate Is
Blind
Family:
Son killed by neighbor who called him 'dirty Arab'. … it all came to a
head last week when the man, Stanley Vernon Majors, walked up to the front
steps of the family home and shot and killed Khalid Jabara, police said. "The
frustration that we continue to see anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, xenophobic rhetoric
and hate speech has unfortunately led up to a tragedy like this," it said.
Hillary
Clinton comments on murder of Tulsa's Khalid Jabara; fundraiser started for
family.
People say that love is or should
be blind. The way I understand things hate is blind and love should see people
and things as they really are and learn to appreciate them as they are, unless,
of course, they were hateful beings. Khalid Jabara saw with the eyes of love and
he deserved to live. His killer was blinded by hate and he deserves to spend
the rest of his unnatural life behind bars.
21:13
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20:46
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Quote of
the Day
“NYC Parks stands firmly
against any unpermitted erection in city parks, no matter how small.” Sam
Biederman, spokesman for the NYC Parks Department on removing the naked status
of Donald Trump
The emperor has no balls indeed,
just plenty of unjustifiable gall.
20:29
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Briefly
Noted, because tired.
Russian Forces Surpasses ISIS in
Killing Syrian Civilians. “State’s Terrorism is more Atrocious than the Terrorism of Extremist
Groups.” Yet, watching CNN and perusing the pages of certain newspapers
might leave one with the impression that Russia would make a good partner with
whim the U.S. can work in Syria.
Russia
deploys jets at Iranian Airbase to combat insurgents in Syria. It seems
that the dark alliance is not as troubled as we were being led to believe.
Hezbollah
Drone Is a Warning to the U.S. “The cheap commercial drone the militant group deployed to bomb
Syrian rebels in Aleppo could soon be seen above battlefields all over the
world—and it’s way ahead of U.S. defenses.” The future of asymmetric
warfare looks more promising.
South
Syria rebels ordered to not attack regime-held town: report. “The Amman-based MOC
instructed the Southern Front not to launch an offensive on Daraa's Sheikh
Maskin.” The southern front has its own complex calculations.
Trump
aide Manafort implicated in pro-Russian protests against US troops. Those
stupid idealist anti-war activists! You want to protest your countries alleged
war-mongering? Might as well make a buck, or few million bucks, out of it.
U.S.
Held Cash Until Iran Freed Prisoners. “Exchange was tightly scripted
and specifically timed to the prisoner release.” A ransom by any other
name would seem as dirty. Also, A
State Department spokesman confirmed Thursday the cash paid to Iran hinged on
the release of three Americans the country was holding prisoner.
18:24
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White
Hairs & Tears
“Who’s behind it [the air strike],
we do not know.” But we do, and from the moment it happened. And, yes, it matters.
The truth that Russia, Iran the Assad regime are the worst human rights
offenders in Syria matters. Because these are the facts, and for journalism
this is what really matters. If they embarrass our leaders, that’s their problem.
If they call for action, then we should act. Spare us your tears, they mean
nothing, if you’re not willing to report the facts.
Journalists who know how to cry
but not how to report facts, and leaders who acknowledge their white hairs but
not their red lines. What next?
16:27
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Silver
Lining
The White Helmets
wake up every day to save the lives others are trying so hard to take. These
volunteer rescue workers have saved 60,000 lives in Syria and for that, they
are under constant attack. Unarmed and impartial, they have just been nominated
for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize. Stand in solidarity with
them.
15:23
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'The
worst place on earth': inside Assad's brutal Saydnaya prison. “Syria’s most
notorious jail has been a journalistic blank spot. Now ex-detainees and
architects have built an accurate model, using ‘ear-witness’ testimony, of the
president’s hellish torture house.”
15:05
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'I
filmed the Syrian boy pulled from the rubble - his wasn't a rare case'. “Aleppo-based
journalist Mustafa al-Sarout filmed five-year-old Omran Daqneesh after he
emerged from the rubble of his home.”
“I’ve seen so many children
rescued out of the rubble, but this child, with his innocence, he had no clue
what was going on,” said Mustafa al-Sarout, an Aleppo-based journalist who
filmed the video that has now gone viral on social media. “He put his hand on
his face and saw blood. He didn’t know even what happened to him.
“I’ve photographed a
lot of airstrikes in Aleppo, but there was so much there in his face, the blood
and the dust mixed, at that age.” […]
For Mohammad, who treated
Omran, the devastation of this latest attack is worsened by the knowledge that
it will not be the last. “We have been living the daily reality of children and
innocent civilians being killed for five years,” he said. “The dumb missiles
and barrel bombs do not discriminate.
“Stop the killing.
It’s not logical that the regime and Russian air forces can keep killing people
and innocent civilians and the world stays silent.
14:18
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Shame
on CNN: part 2
Another segment on Omran Daqneesh
by CNN, and no hint of Russia’s and Assad’s culpability. It’s like doing a
story segment on Kim
Phuc, the crying naked Vietnamese girl from that iconic Vietnam War photograph,
while avoiding any mention of America’s role in her fate. The interview that followed
the above segment was with the spokesman for the Western anti-ISIS coalition
and focused on Russia’s lack of credibility in regard to fighting ISIS, but not
its commission of war crimes such as the one produced this new viral image. This
is clearly an editorial policy and not some isolated incident, and it’s
misleading. CNN may not be in a position to tell with certainty whether the planes
in the incident involved belonged to the Syrian regime or the Russian
government, but, since the two sides are working together, they represent the
same side and should be named as such. Moreover, Omran was not caught in the
crossfire, as the commentator suggested, he was hurt as part of the Assad-Putin
policy of targeting civilian infrastructure in Aleppo and other rebel-held
territories.
We should also be mindful of the involvement
of foreign Shia militias funded by Iran and of the fact that Iran has now opened
some of its basses to allow Russia to conduct strikes in Syria from there. This,
in fact, could have been one of those strikes.
13:28
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Shame
on CNN
The boy in the picture, Omran Daqneesh,
was the victim of an airstrike. The only powers with airplanes in the Syrian conflict
are the Assad regime, Russia and the Western Anti-IS coalition. Since, the Western
coalition does not conduct air strikes in the area where Omran was hurt we can
safely assume that the responsibility here lies with Assad and Russia, and Iran
by implication, since they are all members of the same coalition targeting that
part of Aleppo from land and air. However, anyone watching CNN coverage of this
tragic development would end up thinking that ISIS is the main culprit here and
that Russia is the party trying to stop the violence. The development did not happen
as part of the war on ISIS, but as part of Assad-Russia-Iran war on rebels and
the civilian communities sympathetic with their cause. The facts in this regard
are well-established, and CNN’s unwillingness to reflect that clearly in their
coverage is shameful. The truth is not something at which you shyly hint as
though it were a crime; it’s something that you have to highlight all the time
so that your audience becomes aware of it, especially the causal viewer.
11:40
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Some suggest that Putin’s
foot might look good in that particular Mufti
|
Russian mufti calls for genitalmutilation of all women. While the call by Mufti, hand-picked by Putin, is
sickening, this response by a “controversial Russian Orthodox cleric and blogger, the Church's
former spokesman Vsevolod Chaplin,” coming in defense of this allegedly “time-honoured
tradition" among Muslims, adds another layer of fuckery to the mix:
"You probably don't
need to 'circumcise' all women, there's no need with Orthodox women as they
don't fornicate anyway."
The practice of FGM predates Islam
in the societies where it is still prevalent. Its incorporation into the Sharia
never reflected a consensus among scholars and remains subject of controversy
to date.
11:25
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10:59
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Inside
Saydnaya: Syria's Torture Prison
A regime that runs this kind of
prisons cannot be rehabilitated. And this is how the regime has always treated
its political prisoners, irrespective of their ideological affiliations and
ethnic backgrounds. Sectarian motivations, however, became quite prevalent since
the early days of the revolution.
People are dying
from starvation. They’re not getting even the most basic health care, and are
dying from infected cuts and ingrown fingernails. Many have been brutally
beaten, raped, given electric shocks and more, often to extract forced
“confessions”.
10:12
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Ignore
Him!
 |
| The victim of a Russian airstrike |
Yes. This image and all reports surrounding
it are nothing more than a campaign of emotional blackmail. But, if you were a
realist, or a current member of the Obama administration, it will not sway you.
You’ve seen and ignored worse images and realities than this, and what’s the worst
that happened: you gained an extra white hair or two on the sides of your head.
That’s it. That’s the worst of it. Anyway, it’s too late in the game now to
develop a conscience, isn’t it?
09:29
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| The Putin-Trump Mind Meld, A Wondrous Enterprise |
Anti
What Establishment?
If a billionaire entrepreneur who
pays little or no tax, invests more outside the country than inside, employs
illegal migrants to work in his businesses, periodically file for bankruptcy,
often commiserate with other billionaire entrepreneurs and corrupt officials,
including dictators, from around the world, and who employs the most notorious
of advisers to corrupt global autocrats to manage his presidential campaign,
and whose most trusted family member, to put it mildly, is seen commiserating
with mistresses of autocrats who have repeatedly declared their disdain of democratic
values, not to mention American values and power, if this figure can be seen by
his followers as anti-establishment, then the establishment they are
against must be founded and populated by mostly decent folk. Flawed, yes, but
decent. And Trump’s followers are not really motivated by any noble
anti-establishment sentiments, but by a deep-seated desire to be part of it, in
fact, to control it and have it work exclusively for them. Theirs is envy, and
their righteous anger is a reflection of their inability to accept a system
that cannot be exclusively controlled by them and working for them.
The same set of motivations seems
to apply to Trump himself as well. He, too, feels that he doesn’t belong as
well. He is not anti-establishment. His animus is specifically aimed at the American
establishment, perhaps because he has never been taken seriously by its
members, despite his perceived “successes.” Perhaps he was even ridiculed, and
the more he tried to compensate for the rejection he received through his
continuing endeavor to build and market his personal brand the more he was
ridiculed. Trump is not out to make America great again. He’s out to bring the
entire house down.
09:22
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We
won’t be fooled again.
Poll: Most
Americans say send ground troops to fight ISIS. “…the improvement here comes entirely
among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents. Among that group, 57% now
say things are going well against ISIS, up from 43% in October, while the share
of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who say things are going
well has held steady at 19%.”
The American people have just proven
that they are smarter and more principled than their political leaders. My faith
in democracy and civil society has just been reinforced, unless Trump wins in
November.
09:18
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Different
Priorities!
|
The Obama administration has
always been far more interested in cultivating its own mercenaries in Syria
than actual reliable allies. The incompetence of the Syrian political
opposition has made their job easier. Considering the priorities that Putin and
Obama have set for themselves in Syria, they were both served well by their
respective militias and their political representatives. Putin (and Khamenei)
could have not have prayed for a better “partner” in Syria than Assad that can
help legalize his (their) virtual take-over of the country, and Obama could not
have wished for more useless allies than the Syrian political opposition, whose
incompetence is helping him justify his dithering and fuckups.
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