Oh Thank God--Finally, War With Syria
by Russ Baker on Jun 15, 2013
As we have been reporting over the past 18 months, the Obama Administration has had a very frustrating time inventing reasons to invade Syria or otherwise topple the independent-minded Assad regime. It seemed Bush-style “Curveball” inventions were out of vogue. But good news: they’re back, under a Democrat. And the real motivations—why, those are none of your business.

Why Obama Cannot Undo The Surveillance Society--But We Can
by Russ Baker on Jun 11, 2013
When a country is truly run by a handful, how can they ever let up on surveillance? They can’t, and won’t. But we can make them do it. However, not if we wait for instructions from the establishment.

FBI: Knew About Saudi 9/11 Hijacker Ties--But Lied To Protect "National Security"
by Russ Baker on Jun 5, 2013
In new court filings, the FBI has tacitly admitted that it knows about ties between members of the Saudi royal family and 9/11 hijackers, that it lied about not knowing, and that no one should learn more about this -- for reasons of “national security.”

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There is a huge rush to judgment right now by the press when it comes to the Boston bombings, eerily reminiscent of the Iraq War runup where everyone in the media simply accepted as fact that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction when he didn't.

As Richard Clarke points out, there are some traceable ties between al-Qaeda and Chechnya, but he's at least poking at the unknowns, trying to tease out some nuance.

CLARKE: Well, actually George, Chechens have been involved with al-Qaeda since almost the beginning of al-Qaeda. They were involved in fighting for al-Qaeda in Bosnia. They were involved in fighting against the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, so there is a record there. But the real question here is, how do you tell when someone gets radicalized? They're normal, they're happy kids in Cambridge and then something happens, a switch is flipped.

How can the FBI, how can Homeland Security notice when that happens, or when the radicalization occurs? Especially if it's self-radicalization online? It's very, very difficult to do. What I want to know is, what did the Russians do when he went back to Russia? They had already said they were interested in him, and then he goes back to Russian and spends over six months there. What did they do? Did they follow him around? That's a question we need an answer to.

Putin's Russia is a bad place to be if you're not an oligarch. Over the past ten years Russian oligarchs have increased their power and their wealth at the expense of their middle class. Power has been consolidated to the point where the sole difference between Soviet Russia and post-Soviet Russia is that they no longer try to conceal it.

Foreign Policy outlines a brutal history of Chechen oppression by Russians throughout the years. It's worth reading if only to understand the environment the Tsarnaev family fled in 2002.

This is the defining moment in Chechens' modern history, when they were wrenched away from their mountains and dumped like rubbish in an unfriendly land with a flat horizon. Even the Russian government has recognized this was a genocide, and yet few Russians today appreciate the trauma it caused. Everyone lost someone and, when they were allowed home beginning in 1959, many of those bodies came home to Chechnya with them, to be buried in the mountains, not in the foreign steppes.

They were kept together by their faith, by their Sufi Islam with its closed brotherhoods and secret rituals. The generation that grew up in Kazakhstan nursed a seed of grievance. That seed grew in the fertile soil of Mikhail Gorbachev's perestroika, and flowered into a declaration of independence in the dying days of the Soviet Union.

And this:

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It wasn't that long ago that Mitt Romney was making the impassioned claim that Russia was our number one geopolitical foe and we should be aiming our military might at seeing to it they're cowed and put in their place. Of course, Romney's Reagan-era world view didn't stop him from making the big bucks helping Big Tobacco do business over there, but then, business is business and politics is just better business, right?

Evidently Tagg and Matt Romney agree with that philosophy. They are unafraid of the bogeymen in Russia. Quite the contrary. They welcome the opportunity to bring Russian oligarchs into the fold of vulture capitalism inhabited by American oligarchs, whether real estate or corporate equity just as their father did with his Latin American oligarchs in order to make his fortune.

Let's start with Matt, who took a little jaunt to Russia for the sole purpose of courting oligarchs to his newest venture. Like father, like son. Via New York Times:

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During Monday night’s third and final presidential debate, Mitt Romney the hardline hawk turned tail and ran away from almost every foreign policy position he’s held for months. Monday’s Romney backed unconditional withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2014, after having previously declared the pull-out be “based upon the conditions on the ground determined by the generals.” The supporter of George W. Bush's war on Saddam Hussein now says, "We don't want another Iraq, we don't want another Afghanistan." He pledged to increase foreign aid, after having promised GOP primary voters he would start every country’s assistance “at zero.” And Romney’s bluster about a drawing a red line at Iran developing a “nuclear capability” just “one screwdriver's turn away from a nuclear weapon” was gone.

Of course, to keep the campaign’s focus on economic issues Romney’s strategy was to neutralize President Obama’s advantage on foreign policy and national security by seemingly adopting it lock, stock and not-so-smoking barrel. The only question left isn’t whether Romney's laughably long list of foreign policy flip-fops, flubs and follies shows his unworthiness to be Commander-in-Chief, but whether voters will punish him for it.

Romney Opposed U.S. Strikes Against Bin Laden in Pakistan. In December, Governor Romney brushed off Chuck Todd's suggestion that President Obama deserved credit for ordering the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden:

"I think in a setting like this one where Osama bin Laden was identified to be hiding in Pakistan, that it was entirely appropriate for this president to move in and to take him out," Romney replied, later adding that "In a similar circumstance, I think other presidents and other candidates, like myself, would do exactly the same thing."

As it turns out, not so much. Throughout 2007 and 2008, then Senator Barack Obama declared "we must make it clear that if Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have them in our sights." Like President Bush and John McCain, Mitt Romney opposed unilateral American action to kill the Al Qaeda chieftain and his henchmen:

"I do not concur in the words of Barack Obama in a plan to enter an ally of ours... I don't think those kinds of comments help in this effort to draw more friends to our effort..."There is a war being waged by terrorists of different types and nature across the world," Romney said. "We want, as a civilized world, to participate with other nations in this civilized effort to help those nations reject the extreme with them."

Of course, Romney's confusion about whether or not to respect Pakistani sovereignty may have something to do with his past reversals about whether or not killing Osama Bin Laden even mattered. After insisting in late April 2007 that "It's not worth moving heaven and earth spending billions of dollars just trying to catch one person," Romney under fire from the right reversed course just three days later and declared of Bin Laden, "He's going to pay, and he will die." (That also explains his ridiculous comment five years ago that "I want to double Guantanamo," and his plans now to revive the Bush administration's regime of detainee torture.)

Romney's comical past on Afghanistan and lack of policy specifics on its present largely explain why the GOP nominee was so noticeably silent on the topic at the Republican National Convention.

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Here's a question to ponder: If one belongs to a religion that bans smoking, should one participate in helping tobacco companies profit from emerging markets? Is there a moral question that has to be answered before undertaking that project?

If you're Mitt Romney, the answer is no. The Huffington Post has a brilliant investigative piece out today. Jason Cherkis and Zach Carter pieced it together after a reader tipped them off to documents in the Legacy Tobacco Documents Library.

Bain & Company were corporate consultants hired to assist companies in marketing, expanding, and streamlining their operations. After Mitt Romney had successfully launched Bain Capital and made a lot of money, he was asked to come back and turn around Bain & Company. It could be argued that Bain & Co was languishing because of the activities of Bain Capital, which was leveraging and consolidating companies that Bain & Co might otherwise have provided consulting services to. Whatever the reason, Romney agreed to come back and try to turn it around.

It would seem that one of the drivers of Bain & Co's turnaround was to inject Big Tobacco companies into Russia's emerging markets. From the article:

The Soviet Union's downfall meant rich rewards for any company able to move quickly, and the timing was right for U.S. and British tobacco companies eager to control the cigarette market. Under pressure at home for marketing an addictive and deadly product, domestic sales were shrinking. It was a dilemma Bain and Romney knew well, having worked extensively on behalf of Philip Morris in the U.S. beginning in 1990. In 1992, Bain approached British American Tobacco -- the international conglomerate behind Kool, Lucky Strike, Pall Mall and Benson & Hedges -- offering a lucrative partnership in Russia. It worked.

Worse yet, taxpayer dollars helped launch the effort.

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Oh boy, Mitt Romney stuck his foot in his mouth big time. You can see what a novice he is when it comes to foreign affairs.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said today that Mitt Romney’s characterization of Moscow as the United States’ “number one geopolitical foe” has actually helped Russia.

The Russian leader said Romney’s comments strengthened his resolve to oppose NATO’s plan for a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe, a system Russia believes will degrade its nuclear deterrent. The U.S. insists the system is aimed at Iran, not Russia.

“I’m grateful to him (Romney) for formulating his stance so clearly because he has once again proven the correctness of our approach to missile defense problems,” Putin told reporters, according to the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

“The most important thing for us is that even if he doesn’t win now, he or a person with similar views may come to power in four years. We must take that into consideration while dealing with security issues for a long perspective,” he said, speaking after a meeting with Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic, according to Interfax news agency.

You can see why John McCain's staff was right about Mittens.

Romney knew little about foreign policy when he ran for president in 2008. An internal dossier of John McCain’s presidential campaign said at the time that “Romney’s foreign affairs resume is extremely thin, leading to credibility problems.”

If you recall, the GOP presidential primary field was chock full o' nuts.

Rick Perry labeled the Turkish government “Islamic terrorists.” Newt Gingrich referred to Palestinians as “invented” people. Herman Cain called Uzbekistan “Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan” and memorably blanked when asked what he thought of NATO’s incursion into Libya. Michele Bachmann pledged to close the US embassy in Iran, which hasn’t existed since 1980. Rick Santorum gave a major foreign policy speech at a Jelly Belly factory in California.

I never had so much fun on Twitter as I had during the Republican debates.

And because Romney is so green on foreign policy, he has surrounded himself with Bush-era neocons. John Bolton leads his team, but there are many more Bushies littering his crew.

Of Romney’s forty identified foreign policy advisers, more than 70 percent worked for Bush. Many hail from the neoconservative wing of the party, were enthusiastic backers of the Iraq War and are proponents of a US or Israeli attack on Iran. Christopher Preble, a foreign policy expert at the Cato Institute, says, “Romney’s likely to be in the mold of George W. Bush when it comes to foreign policy if he were elected.” On some key issues, like Iran, Romney and his team are to the right of Bush. Romney’s embrace of the neoconservative cause—even if done cynically to woo the right—could turn into a policy nightmare if he becomes president.
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Romney’s team is notable for including Bush aides tarnished by the Iraq fiasco: Robert Joseph, the National Security Council official who inserted the infamous “sixteen words” in Bush’s 2003 State of the Union message claiming that Iraq had tried to buy enriched uranium from Niger; Dan Senor, former spokesman for the hapless Coalition Provisional Authority under Paul Bremer in Iraq; and Eric Edelman, a top official at the Pentagon under Bush. “I can’t name a single Romney foreign policy adviser who believes the Iraq War was a mistake,” says Cato’s Preble. “Two-thirds of the American people do believe the Iraq War was a mistake. So he has willingly chosen to align himself with that one-third of the population right out of the gate.”

The Nation has much more on these remnants of the cold war still grasping at windmills.

Pretty soon Iran's Supreme Leader will thank Romney for revving up his followers at the U.N.

Nothing says leadership more than bravely standing up against a concern that’s not actually a problem. We’ve had a one-sided battle with Sharia Law in the U.S. No one is fighting for replacing U.S. law with an Islamic moral code, but nonetheless Republicans are heroically fighting against it. Same with aborted fetuses in commercial food stuffs: Not something that’s ever happened but earlier this year Republican freshman Oklahoma state senator Ralph Shortey had the temerity to introduce a bill to outlaw it.

Republicans love what they call “simple solutions” but it’s really just the easiest possible answer to a trumped up crisis. In short: busy work. America needs to streamline for the challenges of the future so we can remain competitive (blah blah blah). Yet Republican offers are akin to organizing all the paperclips in the office by color and size.

Republicans and bureaucracy are, after all, frenemies. Sure they tell the media they despise bureaucracy but secretly love it when it makes them appear to be doing something. Even better if it keeps them from doing anything difficult.

For example: We’re in the middle of an obesity epidemic. It’s the number two leading cause of preventable death in this country. The Center for Disease Control estimates 112,000 American deaths a year due to obesity, this is down from their previous estimate of 365,000 deaths from poor nutrition and physical inactivity. The CDC reports in 2008 Americans forked over $147 billion in medical costs on obesity. We’re dying and going broke from being too fat.

But what are Republicans trying to warn us against? Terrorism. China. Russia. Obamacare. ACORN. The New Black Panthers. The Fed. All of which cumulatively killed no Americans last year.

It’s (ironically) lazy to try to and scare Americans about some elusive menace in order to avoid the reality that we’ve become the proverbial elephants in our own living rooms.

Illegal immigration? Republicans say to secure the border—build a fence—arrest anyone who even looks illegal. Mitt Romney said Arizona’s infamous SB 1070 should be a model for the nation. Which would be something if Mexicans were still coming into the U.S. They’re not. Immigration from Mexico is now net zero. That is actually a way bigger problem than undocumented workers (whom we love in boom times for a way to circumvent the minimum wage and exploit a non-litigious underclass). It’s the fact we are no longer an attractive enough country to motivate Mexicans to come here.

But as we saw last week with the Supreme Court ruling on Arizona’s law, governor Jan Brewer’s just doubled down on a non-problem, “We cannot forget that we are here today because the federal government has failed the American people regarding immigration policy, has failed to protect its citizens, has failed to preserve the rule of law and has failed to secure our borders.”

For a party that likes to peddle free market and common sense they sure get a lot of traction ginning up irrational fears.

Our energy plan is stuck firmly in the last century, but that’s not the point the presumptive Republican nominee decided to make. In March Mitt Romney told Fox News President Obama "has done everything in his power to make it harder for us to get oil and natural gas in this country, driving up the price of those commodities in the case of gasoline." Gas prices were the thing Republicans were going to fix by paying attention to them! With little fanfare, gas prices are down now by the way. Production has increased overall under the Obama administration. Republicans managed to sound the alarm and assign blame for a symptom while steadfastly avoiding the cause entirely.

Think I’m way off here? Remember this is the party that in the wake of September 11th—an attack by citizens of Saudi Arabia, organized in Afghanistan by a leader hanging out in Lebanon—decided to invade (wait for it) Iraq.

Because things indirectly involved with real problems hate us for our freedoms.

Cross posted at TinaDupuy.com

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On Thursday, Willard got very testy with an Occupy protestor who dared to ask him what he was going to do for the 99 percent. Check out this response.

Let me tell you something. America is a great nation, because we’re a united nation. And those who are trying to divide the nation, as you’re trying to do here, and as our president is doing, are hurting this country seriously. The right course for America is not to try to divide America, and try and divid us between one and another. it’s to come together as a nation.

And if you’ve got a better model — if you think China’s better, or Russia’s better, or Cuba’s better, or North Korea’s better — I’m glad to hear all about it.

First of all, since when are Republicans opposed to dividing Americans? These people invented division as a tactic to win elections.

Nixon's Southern Strategy and "Silent Majority." Reagan's "Welfare Queens." Bush/Cheney's "With Us or Against Us." Palin's "Real America."

Not to mention the constant demonizing of immigrants, homosexuals, teachers, union members, Occupy Wall Streeters, Democrats, "elites," academics, Hollywood, Muslims, scientists, progressives, anti-war protestors, attorneys, environmentalists, the media, California -- and on and on.

Also, someone might want to point out to Willard that Russia hasn't been a communist country since he was making millions by raiding corporations and firing workers.

I've often said about John McCain that he is a hammer that sees every problem as a nail, but this is getting ridiculous. After Putin has narrowly regained his party dominance (but with reduced number of party seats) in the Russian legislative election marred by a accusations of tampering**, Grampy McSame has some dire words of warning: "Dear Vlad, the Arab Spring is coming to a neighborhood near you."

Today’s Moscow News quotes Senator John McCain as warning Putin that he could meet Gaddafi’s fate. I was so shocked by such an incendiary remark from a former presidential candidate that I checked out the alleged threat on McCain’s Twitter feed. Sure enough, yesterday McCain tweeted, “Dear Vlad, the Arab Spring is coming to a neighborhood near you.” Later (presumably after this Moscow News article appeared), he tweeted again, “The Post agrees: ‘Spring is in the Russian air’” with a link to a Washington Post article reporting on demonstrations by Russians opposed to Putin.

Another McCain tweet had a link to a BBC tweet, that stated “@SenJohnMcCain is no fan of Putin’s Russia: ‘We have an obligation to speak up when we see evil prevailing in the world’ he tells us.” Further searching led me to an October Businessweek article that said:

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and other “dictators” may be “nervous” after the death of Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi, U.S. Senator John McCain said. “I think dictators all over the world, including Bashar al-Assad, maybe even Mr. Putin, maybe some Chinese, maybe all of them, may be a little bit more nervous,” McCain said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corp. late yesterday. “It’s the spring, not just the Arab spring.” Qaddafi was killed yesterday after an eight-month armed conflict that left thousands dead.

Don't get me wrong. I get it. Putin back as the President with an election as questionable as this one is something for which to be alarmed, although to be fair, Putin's win was well within the percentages he was enjoying in the weeks leading up to the election. And our Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, expressed concern in a reasonable way:

'Russian voters deserve a full investigation of all credible reports of electoral fraud and manipulation and we hope in particular that then Russian authorities will take action on reports that come forward.

'The Russian people, like people everywhere, deserve the right to have their voices heard and their votes counted. That means they deserve free, fair, transparent elections and leaders who are accountable to them.'

But to liken Putin to Gaddafi and then raise the specter of a violent uprising? That seems more than a little bloodthirsty.

** Copy corrected to reflect that the recent elections were for the Russian legislature. The presidential elections are scheduled for March, 2012. Thank you to G.L. for calling it to our attention. ~ed.

As that fat guy who had the movie about global warming tried to tell us, the changing weather is coming back to hit us. A record-setting heatwave in Russia has sparked massive forest fires that are destroying crops normally bought by the U.S., and their government has announced a ban on grain exports.

But hey, isn't it great that the Republicans have sworn to stop the cap-and-trade bill?

Reporting from Los Angeles and Moscow — The price of America's daily bread and meat could soar this fall, as surging wheat prices in anticipation of a Russian ban on exports stoked fears about tight supplies.

Grain shortages and food price hikes in 2007 and 2008 sparked riots worldwide, but agriculture analysts said the U.S. wheat crop has been strong, and that stockpiles of wheat and other grains worldwide are greater now than they were three years ago.

According to media reports, U.S. farmers have rushed to put out millions of bushels of wheat to bolster worldwide inventories. Wheat prices on Friday dropped by 60 cents on the Chicago Board of Trade, voiding Thursday's price run-up.

Yet analysts warned that consumers might be hit with higher prices at the grocery store in the months ahead because of a convergence of factors. With the memory of the previous food crisis still fresh, some countries and consumers may resort to hoarding, which could push prices upward. Speculators and some food companies might seek to exploit public worries.

"The situation is still in flux," said Phil Flynn, a commodities analyst at PFG Best in Chicago. "It is far too soon to say that this is over."

The price of wheat surged to a two-year high when Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced the ban Thursday. Wildfires and serious droughts have ravaged a large swath of central Russia this summer, destroying one-fifth of its crop. Russia is one of the world's largest wheat exporters.

The Ukraine government, also a large global wheat supplier, reportedly canceled a number of its contracts because of similar dry-weather issues.

And as an added climate-change bonus:

MOSCOW: Russia's Emergencies Minister has warned that wildfires raging in the west of the country could release radioactive nuclides from land contaminated by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

Sergei Shoygu said special laboratories were monitoring a potential release of contaminants in Bryansk region on the border with Ukraine, which was sprayed with caesium-137 and strontium-90 after the explosion of the power plant's fourth reactor in 1986. The alarming statement came as firefighters continued to battle hundreds of fires across central and western Russia amid the hottest temperatures in more than a century.

Wildfires around Moscow have forced the Defence Ministry to order munitions moved from a military depot near the capital, the Ria Novosti news agency reported. Elsewhere there were reports that a secret communications centre of the Russian Army had gone up in flames.