Today’s News 20th April 2018

• These Are The Men & Women Most-Admired By Brits In 2018

  In 2002, David Attenborough was named among the 100 Greatest Britons by a BBC poll.

  And as Statista’s Niall McCarthy notes, the veteran broadcaster and naturalist is still the most admired man in the UK, according to a new YouGov survey. Widely considered a national treasure in Britain, Attenborough had an admiration score of 16.6 percent, ahead of Barack Obama’s 12.3 percent.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Queen Elizabeth II is the most admired woman in the UK with an admiration score of 19.6 percent. Michelle Obama came second with 10.3 percent while Judi Dench came third with 10.3 percent.

  

• How The Guardian Fulfills George Orwell's Prediction Of 'Newspeak'

  Authored by Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  On Sunday April 15th, Britain’s Guardian bannered “OPCW inspectors set to investigate site of Douma chemical attack” and pretended that there was no question that a chemical attack in Douma Syria on April 7th had actually occurred, and the article then went further along that same propaganda-line, to accuse Syria’s Government of having perpetrated it. This ‘news’ story opened [and clarificatory comments from me will added in brackets]:

  UN chemical weapons investigators were set on Sunday to begin examining the scene of a chemical attack in the Syrian city of Douma, which had prompted the joint US, French and British strikes against military installations and chemical weapons facilities near the capital, Damascus.

  The arrival of the delegation from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) came as the Syrian military announced that it had “purified” [no source provided, but this — from 7 March 2018 — is the only source that existed prior to the April 14th missiles-invasion of Syria, and its meaning is very different: the region of eastern Ghouta, of which Douma is a part, after a two-month campaign that killed nearly 2,000 civilians [no source provided as regards either the number, or that all of them were ‘civilians’ and that none of them were jihadists or “terrorists”], following years of siege.

  The propaganda-article continued directly: 

  “Units of our brave armed forces, and auxiliary and allied forces, completed the purification of eastern Ghouta, including all its towns and villages, of armed terrorist organisations,” the general command statement said.

  No source was provided for that, but this sentence is a sly mind-manipulation, because here is what the Syrian Government’s General Command had actually said: “Statement of the Army General Command declaring Eastern Ghouta clear of terrorism” as headlined by the Syrian Government itself.

  In other words: the Guardian’s ‘journalist’ had substituted the word “clear” by the word “purify” and did this after having already asserted but not documented, that the Government had just completed “a two-month campaign that killed nearly 2,000 civilians.”

  When the Syrian Government announces that an area has been “cleared of terrorists (or of terrorism),” the US-allied propagandist uses the word “purify,” such as “purified the region of eastern Ghouta” or “the purification of eastern Ghouta, including all its towns and villages, of armed terrorist organisations.”

  But by the time that the reader gets there to “purification … of armed terrorist organisations,” the reader has already been indoctrinated to believe that Syria’s Government is trying to “purify” land, or perpetrate some type of ethnic-cleansing. 

  Later, the article asserts that,

  “The OPCW mission will arrive in Douma eight days after the chemical attack, and days after the area fell to the control of Russian military and Syrian government forces. That delay, along with the possibility of the tampering of evidence by the forces accused of perpetrating the attack, raises doubts about what the OPCW’s inspectors might be able to discover.”

  However, a fierce debate is being waged over whether this was not any real “chemical attack” but instead a staged event by the jihadists in order to draw Trump back into invading Syria. In other words: any journalistic reference yet, at this time, to the event as “the chemical attack” instead of as “the alleged chemical attack” is garbage, just as, prior to the guilty-verdict in a murder trial, no journalistic reference may legitimately be made to the defendant as “the murderer,” instead of as “the defendant.” That is lynch-mob ‘journalism’, which Joseph Goebbels championed.

  The Joseph-Goebbels-following ‘journalist’ has thus opened by implying that the Russia-allied Syrian Government is trying to crush a democratic revolution, instead of the truth, that the US-allied Governments are trying to overthrow and replace the Russia-allied Syrian Government.

  

  It’s a big difference, between the lie, and the truth.

  Another story in the April 15th Guardian was “Pressure grows on Russia to stop protecting Assad as US, UK and France press for inquiry into chemical weapons stockpiles” and this one pretended that the issue is for “Russia to stop protecting Assad,” who is the democratically elected and popular President of Syria, and not to stop the invasion of Syria since 2011 by US and Saudi backed foreign jihadists to overthrow him.

  Furthermore, as regards “press for inquiry into chemical weapons stockpiles,” the real and urgent issue right now is to allow the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into Douma to hold an independent and authoritative investigation into the evidence there. Russia pressed for it at the U.N. Security Council and the US and its allies blocked it there. But the OPCW went anyway — even after the US-allied invasion on April 14th — and this courageous resistance by them against the US dictatorship can only be considered heroic.

  That type of ‘news’-reporting is virtually universal in The West, among the US and its allied governments, which refer to themselves as ‘democracies’ and refer to any Government that they wish to overthrow and replace by their own selected dictator, as ‘dictatorships’, such as these regimes had referred to Iraq in 2003, Libya in 2011, Syria forever, and Ukraine in 2014.

  

• Over 95% Of World's Population Breathes Dangerously-Polluted Air, New Report

  Most of the world’s population resides in regions where air quality contains life-threatening pollutants. An estimated 95 percent of people are breathing unhealthy air where ambient (outdoor) fine particulate matter concentrations (soot particles) surpass the World Health Organization’s Air Quality Guideline of 10 µg/m3, a new report has discovered.

  Almost 60 percent of the world’s population breathe unsafe air in areas where fine particulate matter exceeds a dangerous level of 35 µg/m3.

  The comprehensive study noticed most of the world’s hazardous air and the heaviest societal burdens are hitting impoverished communities the hardest.

  

  An Indian girls holds a banner during a protest against air pollution in New Delhi, India, Sunday, Nov. 6, 2016.  (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

  According to the State of Global Air project, a joint venture between the Health Effects Institute, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), and the University of British Columbia, fine particle air pollution is the most significant enviormental hazard worldwide. It is “responsible for a substantially larger number of attributable deaths than other more well-known behavioral risk factors such as alcohol use, physical inactivity, or high sodium intake,” said the report. Medium to long-term exposure to fine particle air pollution — contributed to an estimated 6.1 million deaths worldwide in 2016.

  The report says air pollution can significantly affect people’s health, including “making it difficult to breathe for those with asthma or other respiratory diseases, sending the young and old to hospital or causing them to miss school or work, and contributing to early death from heart and lung disease.”

  In the chart below, the report specifies that air pollution is the fourth-highest leading cause of death on a global scale, right after high blood pressure, smoking, obesity, and diet.

  Figure 1. Global ranking of risk factors by total number of deaths from all causes for all ages and both sexes in 2016.

  

  The report specifies 95 percent of the world’s population lives in regions exceeding WHO Air Quality Guidelines. Base on the data below, the highest concentrations of air pollution are in regions of Africa, Middle East, India, and much of Asia.

  “The highest concentrations of population-weighted annual average PM2.5 (see “Defining Ambient Air Pollution” textbox) in 2016 were in countries in North Africa (e.g., Niger at 204 µg/m3 and Egypt at 126 µg/m3 ), West Africa (e.g., Cameroon at 140 µg/m3 and Nigeria at 122 µg/m3 ), and in the Middle East (e.g., Saudi Arabia at 188 µg/ m3 and Qatar at 148 µg/m3 ). The high outdoor concentrations in these regions were due mainly to windblown mineral dust. However, in some of these countries (Niger, Nigeria, and Cameroon), high proportions of the population burn solid fuels in the home and may also engage in open burning of agricultural lands or forests, both of which can also contribute substantially to outdoor air pollution.

  The next-highest concentrations appeared in South Asia, where combustion emissions from multiple sources, including household solid fuel use, coal-fired power plants, agricultural and other open burning, and industrial and transportation-related sources, are the main contributors. The population-weighted annual average PM2.5 concentrations were 101 µg/m3 in Bangladesh, 78 µg/m3 in Nepal, and 76 µg/m3 in both India and Pakistan. The population-weighted annual average concentration in China was 56 µg/m3 . Estimates for population-weighted annual average PM2.5 concentrations were lowest (≤ 8 µg/m3 ) in Australia, Brunei, Canada, Estonia, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, New Zealand, Sweden, and several Pacific island nations.”

  Figure 2. Comparison of 2016 annual average PM2.5 concentrations to the WHO Air Quality Guideline.

  

  Figure 3. Trends in population-weighted annual average PM2.5 concentrations in the 10 most populous countries plus the European Union, 2010–2016

  

  “Air pollution takes a huge personal toll worldwide, making it difficult to breathe for those with respiratory disease, sending the young and old to hospital, missing school and work, and contributing to early death,” Bob O’Keefe, vice president of HEI, said in a statement.

  “The trends we report show real progress in some parts of the world — but serious challenges remain to eliminate this avoidable affliction,” he added.

  According to the report, China and India were both responsible for more than 50 percent of global deaths linked to air pollution.

  It also found that China’s air pollution has stabilized; meanwhile, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India have experienced dramatic increases in air pollution since 2010.

  The report then dives into household air pollution from burning “solid fuels for cooking and heating is the 8th leading global risk factor contributing to disease burden.” Over 2.45 billion people — one in three global citizens — were exposed to harmful indoor air pollution from burning solid fuels in 2016. Shockingly, it contributed to one in four pollution deaths in India and one in five in China.

  ” People living in homes using solid fuels can face PM2.5 levels 6 times higher than even the leaststringent WHO Interim Air Quality Target for PM2.5 and as much as 20 times higher than the full WHO Air Quality Guideline of 10 µg/m3 .”

  Figure 5. Proportion of population exposed to household air pollution from burning of solid fuels in 2016.

  

  Figure 6. Number of people and percentage of population exposed to household air pollution from solid fuel burning in countries with populations over 50 million and at least 10% solid fuel use in 2016.

  

  Figure 7. Trends in proportion of population exposed to household air pollution from burning of solid fuels for selected regions of the world.

  

  “The gap between the most polluted air on the planet and the least polluted was striking. While developed countries have made moves to clean up, many developing countries have fallen further behind while seeking economic growth,” O’Keefe said.

  But he added: “There are reasons for optimism, though there is a long way to go. China seems to be now moving pretty aggressively, for instance in cutting coal and on stronger controls. India has really begun to step up on indoor air pollution, for instance through the provision of LPG [liquefied petroleum gas] as a cooking fuel, and through electrification.”

  The report then glances over the burden of disease attributed to air population and found a wide range of health effects, including asthma, increased hospitalizations, illness, and reduced life expectancy from heart and lung disease. Some of those diseases include:

  • ischemic heart disease,

  • cerebrovascular disease (ischemic stroke and hemorrhagic stroke),

  • lung cancer,

  •  chronic-obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and

  • lower-respiratory infections (LRIs).

  Figure 9. Numbers of deaths attributable to ambient PM2.5 in 2016.

  

  Figure 10. Percentage of global deaths by cause attributable to ambient particulate matter and to household air pollution

  

  Figure 11. Numbers of deaths attributable to household burning of solid fuels in 2016.

  

  “The combined burden from both ambient and household air pollution falls most heavily on low and middle-income countries where exposures to both are high. These countries face a double burden,” stated the report.

  Figure 13. Comparison of the percentages of deaths attributable to PM2.5, household, and total air pollution by sociodemographic (SDI) index.

  

  Figure 14. Comparison of the global patterns of age-standardized death rates for both sexes attributable to total air pollution.

  

  The State of Global Air report, points out the ugly side of globalization, as many U.S. corporations offshored their supply chains and the pollution that goes along with manufacturing to the Eastern Hemisphere. It is becoming increasingly obvious that the United States has been spared in terms of air pollution, but that might not last for long, because President Trump wants to rebuild overseas supply chains back into America’s heartland. Will the opportunity cost of restoring America’s greatness be at the health expense of America’s middle-class? It certainly will…

  

• The Road To 2025 (Part 2) – Russia And China Have Had Enough

  Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

  Part 1 of this series focused on how the U.S. empire no longer provides any real benefit to the average American citizen. Rather, the spoils of overseas wars, the domestic surveillance state and an overall corrupt economy are being systematically funneled to a smaller and smaller group of generally unsavory characters. The public’s starting to recognize this reality, which is why we saw major populist movements emerge on both the traditional right and left of the political spectrum in 2016.

  As millions of Americans emerge from their long slumber, much of the world’s been aware of this reality for a long time. They don’t see the U.S. as a magnanimous humanitarian empire, that’s a fairytale more suited for children’s books and the mass media. In fact, it seems clear that the billions of humans who live in various sovereign nations around the world would certainly prefer to be in control of their own destinies as opposed to mere vassal states of the U.S., they simply haven’t possessed the military or economic power to stand up and chart their own course. But things are changing.

  

  The most significant geopolitical change of the 21st century is the emergence of China, and the reemergence of Russia, as globally significant military powers. This is the core driver behind the establishment’s panic about Russia. It has nothing to do with Putin’s authoritarianism or human rights abuses, that’s just marketing directed at a heretofore extremely gullible public.

  In reality, those determined to perpetuate a unipolar world run by the U.S. are appalled and concerned about the fact Russia was able to become involved in Syria and prevent another regime change operation. Russia very publicly, and very successfully, stood up and said “no” to U.S. imperial ambitions in Syria. This isn’t just historically significant, it’s seen as blasphemous and recalcitrant by the U.S. status quo.

  With that out of the way, let’s revisit a few things I wrote over the weekend in my first thoughts on the latest Syria strike:

  Russian leadership are not a bunch of fools, nor will they back down. After last night, they know for certain the U.S. empire is determined to castrate them globally at all costs in order to impede an inevitable emergence of a multi-polar world.

  I don’t think Russia or Iran will respond with a shock and awe attack any time soon, nor will this likely spiral out of control in the near-term. It’s more likely we’ll see this all play out over the course of the next 5 years or so.

  I also don’t expect this to go nuclear, but I think the chances the U.S. experiences an imperial collapse similar to that of the USSR (or like any historically unmanageable and corrupt empire) has become increasingly likely. My view at this point is the U.S. and its global power position will be so dramatically altered in the years ahead, it’ll be almost unrecognizable by 2025, as a result of both economic decline and major geopolitical mistakes. This will cause the public to justifiably lose faith in all leadership and institutions.

  The more I reflect on what’s going on, the more I’m convinced the U.S. is trying to goad Russia into a response with these provocations. I think the Russians know this, which is precisely why they’re responding with cool heads to a blatantly illegal and unconstitutional strike likely based on a fake narrative. In fact, we still don’t have any reliable or rock solid evidence of what happened. Naturally, this didn’t stop Donald Trump from bombing without consulting Congress, nor did it stop Theresa May from doing the same without consulting Parliament. Please tell me again about our illustrious Western democracies. I suppose that’s just another fairytale for public consumption.

  Moreover, Russia’s lack of a military response shouldn’t be seen as a sign of weakness, but as an intentional and well thought out strategy. The Russians seem to think the U.S. (and UK) are acting like desperate feral lunatics and the best thing they can do is sit back, play defense, and let the short-sighted fools running the American empire ruin themselves. The erratic and demonstrably thuggish and shady manner in which the U.S., UK and France behaved in this latest criminal act has not been lost upon the populations of the world, including considerable portions of the American and British populace who are disgusted at what these governments are doing in our names. Russia’s strategy is to look reasonable on the global stage compared to a U.S. which seems increasingly crazy and unhinged. It seems to be working.

  That being said, Russia by itself isn’t capable of successfully standing up to the U.S. empire in the long-run. This is where China comes into play. Chinese leadership have also had enough but are, like the Russians, holding back and acting like the reasonable adults in the room. We saw this most recently with the Chinese cooling down the trade wars. U.S. pundits cheered this as a sign of weakness, but I think the opposite. China’s playing the same game as Russia. Allow U.S. leadership to continue to look like insufferable bullies on the world stage until everyone gets completely sick of U.S. dominance.

  A reader who lives in Europe wrote the following comment on my last post, which seems like a fair representation of global public opinion at this point:

  The Soviet empire fell because the cost of the arms race depleted the rest of the society to such a degree that a collapse was inevitable. I believe the US are in a similar state now. The current wars are carried out by technology at distance, or by proxy warriors, and not by actual americans on ground. How long can the citizens carry that burden? At the same time the US is losing the moral support within the public among their allies, as I know first hand, by being from a european allied country. Although our domestic politic leadership and mainstream press are supporting the US, especially when they launch some rockets, opposition and disbelief is large and growing among normal people. The US has lost its posiotion as our leading star, not just among the leftist, but all over the spectrum. The insanity and lies are becoming so evident that it is impossible to deny it.

  The U.S. is rapidly losing support and confidence at the grassroots level, both at home and abroad. We see the lies and we see the disregard for the Constitution. The U.S. and its pet allies like the UK and France will all be increasingly seen as rogue states by much of the world if they keep this up.

  Finally, for those of you who doubt which side China is on in this global drama, let me point out the following excerpts from a recent editorial published in the state-sponsored Global Times earlier this week:

  The facts cannot be distorted. This military strike was not authorized by the UN, and the strikes targeted a legal government of a UN member state. The US and its European allies launched strikes to punish President Bashar al-Assad for a suspected chemical attack in Duma last weekend. However, it has not been confirmed if the chemical weapons attack happened or if it did, whether government forces or opposition forces launched it. International organizations have not carried out any authoritative investigation.

  The Syrian government has repeatedly stressed that there is no need for it to use chemical weapons to capture the opposition-controlled Duma city and the use of chemical weapons has provided an excuse for Western intervention. The Syrian government’s argument or Trump’s accusations against the “evil” Assad regime, which one is in line with basic logic? The answer is quite obvious.

  The US has a record of launching wars on deceptive grounds. The Bush government asserted the Saddam regime held chemical weapons before the US-British coalition troops invaded Iraq in 2003. However, the coalition forces didn’t find what they called weapons of mass destruction after overthrowing the Saddam regime. Both Washington and London admitted later that their intelligence was false.

  Washington’s attack on Syria where Russian troops are stationed constitute serious contempt for Russia’s military capabilities and political dignity. Trump, like scolding a pupil, called on Moscow, one of the world’s leading nuclear powers, to abandon its “dark path.” Disturbingly, Washington seems to have become addicted to mocking Russia in this way. Russia is capable of launching a destructive retaliatory attack on the West. Russia’s weak economy is plagued by Western sanctions and squeezing of its strategic space. That the West provokes Russia in such a manner is irresponsible for world peace.

  The situation is still fomenting. The Trump administration said it will sustain the strikes. But how long will the military action continue and whether Russia will fight back as it claimed previously remain uncertain. Western countries continue bullying Russia but are seemingly not afraid of its possible counterattack. Their arrogance breeds risk and danger.

  China and Russia will work together, often behind the scenes, to convince the rest of the world that the U.S. has become a rogue state, and will use this argument to build international support for a multi-polar world. The only thing that could slow this process down is if the U.S. stops acting like a rogue state, something that appears increasingly unlikely with Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State and John Bolton as National Security Advisor.

  Part 3 will focus on the weak link in U.S. imperial dominance, the USD.

  WW3 will be more about currency and the financial system than missiles.

  — Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) April 18, 2018

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• Russia And Iran Complete First Oil-For-Goods Transfer, Extend Agreement For A Year

  Nearly four years after Iran and Russia first agreed to an oil-for-goods swap agreement worth billions of dollars, RT is reporting that the first delivery of Iranian crude oil to Russia under the program has been completed, and the two sides are angling to extend the deal, possible for another five years.

  “The agreement is effective; it has been extended for the year, but in general, we think it should be extended for five years,” said Russian Energy Ministry Aleksandr Novak.

  As we reported more than three years ago, the $20 billion agreement was initially signed in April 2014 when Iran was facing Western sanctions over its nuclear program (they have since been lifted thanks to the Iran deal, but will likely soon be reimposed).

  

  When the sanctions against Tehran were lifted in 2016, Novak said the deal was no longer necessary. However, Novak said in March 2017 that the plan was back on the table with Russia buying 100,000 barrels per day from Iran and selling the country $45 billion worth of goods. Another agreement was later signed in late May.

  Current Iranian oil supplies under the program amount to five million tons per year. The first delivery was made in November 2017 and totaled one million tons.

  Russia and Iran have also discussed cooperation in energy, electricity, nuclear energy, gas and oil, as well as cooperation in the field of railways, industry, and agriculture. Novak said in February that Russia’s state trading enterprise Promsirieimport has been authorized by the government to carry out the purchase of Iran’s oil through the oil-for-goods program under study by both countries

  The oil-for-goods swaps are expected to boost trade between the two countries (while conveniently circumventing the petrodollar system). The nations have also signed six provisional agreements to collaborate on “strategic” energy deals worth up to $30 billion.

  Presidential aide Yuri Ushakov said earlier this month that Russian investment in Iranian oil and gas fields could total more than $50 billion.

  And in a sign of closer cooperation to come, Ushakov said Iran is weighing whether to enter the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union – a move that could come within months. A free-trade zone deal would be expected to “trigger further development of our bilateral trade and expansion of investment cooperation.”

  

• "A Calamitous Collapse": Former Podesta Group Employees Reveal Truth Behind Firm's Downfall

  Former Podesta Group employees have spilled the beans about their former boss, Tony Podesta – in a scathing Wall Street Journal article which details the firm’s collapse. As part of the report, The Journal got its hands on “internal Podesta Group accounting,” as well as “financial documents, calendars and communications.”

  

  The D.C. lobbying firm founded in 1993 by John and Tony Podesta folded shop following Hillary Clinton’s monumental loss in the 2016 US election, when a flood of clients ran for the door virtually overnight, realizing the Podesta Group’s influence ended with the Clinton campaign. 

  The Journal describes Tony Podesta’s fall as a “calamitous collapse” following the 2016 US election:

  Then he fell, a calamitous collapse propelled by unexpected blows, delivered by fate and made worse by hubris. Financial problems, legal threats and the election of President Donald Trump took it all away—the clients, the firm and, finally, Mr. Podesta’s position as one of Washington’s most influential players.

  Here are some cliff notes from the report:

  • The Podesta Group ended 2015 as Washington D.C.’s third largest Lobbying firm, with nearly $30 million in revenue from over 100 clients – who promptly bailed after Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election. That didn’t seem to bother Tony.  

  The string of embarrassing news accounts disturbed many of the Podesta Group’s corporate clients, companies that preferred to stay clear of such publicity. Mr. Podesta operated as if the whole mess would soon blow over. –WSJ

  • The Podesta Group got in trouble for the IRS for improperly reporting a $300,000 shipping expense for Tony Podesta’s art, after which he began billing his firm $360,000 a year to rent pieces displayed at the office. 

  Employees of the Podesta Group set up a system to prevent Mr. Podesta from being reimbursed by the company for personal expenditures. A 36-page instruction manual for Mr. Podesta’s executive assistants included this directive: “It is up to you and your best judgment as to what gets reimbursed.”

  • Podesta told his employees that he would entertain letting them buy equity in the firm – then worth an estimated $50 million, then stiffed them when they showed up to discuss. 

  Firm employees approached Mr. Podesta in early 2014 about selling them a share of the business. The Podesta Group was worth at least $50 million at the time, former employees estimated. Over dinner, Mr. Podesta told them he was open to the idea and suggested they meet with lawyers.

  On the day of the meeting, employees gathered in the firm’s conference room. Mr. Podesta didn’t show.

  • Tony Podesta worked for clients without his firm’s knowledge – such as Italian tire maker Pirelli, which paid $113,500 a year to Podesta while the Podesta Group was concurrently representing French tire manufacturer Michelin.  

  Neither Michelin nor its Podesta Group lobbyists knew about Mr. Podesta’s side deal, according to the people involved.

  • SunTrust bank severed ties with the Podesta Group when they discovered that they were doing work for a U.S. subsidiary of a sanctioned Russian bank – presumably Russia’s Kremlin-owned Sberbank, which paid the Podesta group $170,000 over a 6 month period through September 2016 to lobby against 2014 economic sanctions by the Obama administration.

  SunTrust Banks Inc. sought to sever ties with the firm over the sanctioned Russian bank. The Podesta Group’s chief executive sent an exasperated email to a colleague. “Tony thinks these types of clients have no repercussions on the firm,” she said, but “this should really provide evidence that we have to take the clients we bring on seriously.”

  Following Mrs. Clinton’s defeat that November, the Podesta Group cut bonuses and commissions.

  • One day after US prosecutors announced the indictments of Manafort and Gates, “an official with the firm’s new bank, Chain Bridge Bank, demanded $655,000 in cash or collateral within 24 hours – or it would cut the firm’s credit line.“

  Mr. Trump, who occasionally pointed an unwelcome spotlight on the firm, tweeted that day: “The biggest story yesterday, the one that has the Dems in a dither, is Podesta running from his firm.” –WSJ

  The biggest story yesterday, the one that has the Dems in a dither, is Podesta running from his firm. What he know about Crooked Dems is….

  — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 31, 2017

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  • Podesta’s purchases of artwork behind his wife’s back reportedly caused Heather Podesta to file for divorce. Tony kept most of his art collection, while Heather received nearly $5 million in retirement savings, homes in Washington and Manhattan, and $4 million paid quarterly over five years. 

  

  • The day after Tony’s Podesta’s expensive divorce was finalized, he told employees the firm could make more money by abandoning their liberal ethos and representing big tobacco and the NRA – leading to one lobbyist quitting, costing the firm over $2 million in annual revenue. 

  • Clients were spooked as Special Counsel Robert Mueller began closing in on associate Paul Manafort. Recall the Podesta Group decided (coincidentally) to retroactively file as a foreign agent for their work with the Manafort’s Pro-Russia Centre for a Modern Ukraine campaign – tied to former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, shortly before Manafort’s indictment. The Podesta Group made $1.2 million as part of that effort. 

  Before dawn on Monday Oct. 23, 2017, NBC News reported that Mr. Mueller was preparing to indict Mr. Manafort and implicate Mr. Podesta regarding the Ukraine work. The phones started ringing: Clients wanted to know what was going on. The firm’s bank wanted to discuss its account.

  The following night, Mr. Podesta threw himself a birthday party, serving hundreds of guests pizza from a brick-oven stove in his backyard in Kalorama. –WSJ

  • The unraveling was swift. As clients such as Wells Fargo, Wal Mart and Oracle Corp. bailed on the Podesta Group, they death-spiraled into default – as Tony refused to pledge his giant art collection against firm obligations. 

  With clients leaving, the Podesta Group had no money. Rent was due the next day. One idea was to use Mr. Podesta’s art collection as collateral for a loan, but he refused.

  “At that time, it was inadvisable to provide additional guarantees as an individual for the obligations of the corporation,” the Podesta Group’s spokeswoman said.

  …

  The Podesta Group’s chief financial officer sent Mr. Podesta a 7:23 p.m. email: “If we don’t have collateral pledged prior to 5pm tomorrow, we will be in default.” If the firm went into default, the CFO wrote, “we will not be able to meet our rent, your art payments, ad campaigns, and most importantly payroll.”

  Mr. Podesta responded: “need list of next 5 layoffs,” among other questions. The next day, he left for an art show in Turin, Italy. The bank’s deadline passed.

  …

  On Friday, the firm’s CFO quit. That night, a senior manager sent an email to Mr. Podesta, still in Italy, saying the bank had frozen the firm’s funds.

  “This means that we have no way to pay employees,” the email said. “If we do not alert employees immediately that we have no way to pay them for their work, the firm is committing fraud.” –WSJ

  Meanwhile, in October 2017 a “long time” former Podesta Group executive with “direct personal knowledge” detailed several other aspects of life inside Tony Podesta’s lobbying machine to Tucker Carlson. Some bombshell claims and quotes from the former employee:

  • In 2013, John Podesta allegedly recommended that Tony hire David Adams, Hillary Clinton’s chief adviser at the State Department, giving them a “direct liaison” between the group’s Russian clients and Hillary Clinton’s State Department

  • In late 2013 or early 2014, Tony Podesta and a representative for the Clinton Foundation reportedly met to discuss how to help Uranium One – the Russian owned company that controls 20 percent of American Uranium Production – and whose board members gave over $100 million to the Clinton Foundation.

  • “Tony Podesta was basically part of the Clinton Foundation.”

  • Believing she would win the 2016 election, Russia considered the Podesta Group’s connection to Hillary highly valuable.

  Separately, White House visitor logs revealed that Tony Podesta visited the White House at least 114 times during the Obama administration, and was said to have had “special access” to the administration through his brother, John Podesta, while lobbying for various pro-Kremlin interests.

  • Podesta Group was a nebulous organization with no board oversight and all financial decisions made by Tony Podesta. Carlson’s source said payments and kickbacks could be hard for investigators to trace, describing it as a “highly secret treasure trove.” One employee’s only official job was to manage Tony Podesta’s art collection, which could be used to conceal financial transactions.

  The Podesta group also earned $180,000 lobbying for Russian-owned mining company Uranium One during the same period that the Clinton Foundation was receiving millions from individuals connected to the U1 transaction.

  The WSJ must have inadvertently left out another factor which may have contributed to Podesta Group clients heading for the hills; a spotlight on Tony Podesta’s strange artwork which began swirling around the internet during the emergence of the discredited “pizzagate” theory.

  Internet sleuths pointed to a June, 2015 issue of “Washington Life” magazine featuring some of Tony Podesta’s artwork, along with a 2004 Washington Post article entitled Married, With Art – describing how shocked Podesta guests stumbled across pictures of naked teenagers during a house tour. 

  “At political events, there’s an inevitable awkwardness,” former Clinton administration official Sally Katzen

  Folks attending a house tour in the Lake Barcroft neighborhood in Falls Church earlier this year got an eyeful when they walked into a bedroom at the Podesta residence hung with multiple color pictures by Katy Grannan, a photographer known for documentary-style pictures of naked teenagers in their parents’ suburban homes. “They were horrified,” Heather recalls, a grin spreading across her face. –WaPo

  One piece of art which sparked curiosity is an illustration of a girl against a green background:

  

  As well as more pictures of children laying around:

  

  …from an artist who creates pictures of children in grotesque circumstances:

  

  Then there’s artist Louise Bourgeois’ “Arch of Hysteria” in Podesta’s Falls Church home – a headless body contorted into a “tetanus arch” – which also happens to be a pose Jeffrey Dahmer posed at least one victim. Comet Ping Pong pizza shop owner James Alefantis – another figure in the unproven “pizzagate” controversy, thought it was pretty cool while he was hanging out at Podesta’s place.

  

  Here’s one of Podesta’s many other staircases in 2014:

  

  Tony also loaned out a wax statue entitled “Dismembered” to the DC College of Arts and Sciences in 2011, which appears to depict a vivisected child:

  

  

  At the end of the day, disturbing art or not – Hillary Clinton’s loss meant that Tony Podesta’s ability to provide clients access to the White House had disappeared for at least four more years. Indeed, the Podesta Group lost its most valuable commodity on the night of November 8, 2016 – and the rest is history.

  

  

• The Dollar's 70-Year Dominance Slowly Coming To An End

  Authored by Alex Deluce via GoldTelegraph.com,

  The US dollar hasn’t been backed by gold since 1971, but that might change soon.

  

  Republican Congressman Alex Mooney is proposing that the US once again place value on the dollar by backing it with physical gold. The problem is, the Federal Reserve has been printing money with the abandon of a drunken copy machine, and the 147.3 million ounces of gold being held in Ft. Knox may not be enough to cover the out-of-control fiat currency currently in circulation.

  According to Alex Mooney’s bill, the dollar has decreased 30 percent in purchasing power since 2000. It has lost 96 percent of its value since 1913. On an average, the US is devalued by 50 percent every generation.

  The Federal Reserve – silently robbing you of your purchasing power ever since 1913…

  RETWEET if you agree. 🔥🔥 pic.twitter.com/DoXw2fmKGt

  — Gold Telegraph (@GoldTelegraph_) March 29, 2018

  https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  If the gold standard were to be reinstated, control of the dollar would revert to free market forces instead of the whim of the Federal Reserve. It would mean that each dollar would have its equivalent in gold, as it did prior to 1913. At that time, the US economy grew at a robust annual rate of 4 percent compared to an average annual growth of 2 percent since 2000.

  Officially, the US has 8,133.5 tons of gold in reserves, although the government won’t confirm that number. No one is permitted inside the various vaults to verify. Even the purity of the available gold bars is in question, as many may not conform to industry standards. As other countries contemplate the return to the gold standard, unless the US catches up, the dollar will lose its dominance as the world reserve currency.

  

  China launched its oil futures-backed Petro-Yuan in March.

  The oil industry has revolved around the petrodollar since the 1970s. It is expected that the Petro-Yuan will take up to $800 billion worth of trade from the petrodollar. Currently, the petrodollar secures global demand for the dollar. For the US, the petrodollar translates into tremendous purchasing power. China’s Petro-Yuan may change all that.

  China is the largest crude oil importer in the world, and that may give it enough leverage to unseat the US dollar when it begins to pay Saudi Arabia for its crude in Petro-Yuan. This provides an opportunity for oil exporters to bypass the current powerful petrodollar arrangement. If this happens, it could mean serious trouble for the US dollar. The value of the dollar is heavily dependent upon US oil imports. If oil exporters become dependent on the Petro-Yuan instead of the petrodollar, it could be the death blow for the dollar. In addition to the Petro-Yuan, China has been quietly building up its gold reserves for years and may have plans to ultimately back the yuan with gold.

  President Trump has been discussing tariffs on Chinese imports while attempting to persuade Beijing not to use its crude oil contracts as a means of trade. China is unlikely to agree to this, thus opening the possibility of a nasty trade war between the two countries.

  China has much to lose in a trade war. Its economy is overly dependent on exports to the US. Also, the Petro-Yuan is, as yet, an unknown quantity, while the petrodollar has been securely established for decades. In addition, the US is less dependent on oil than China, as it is able to produce more oil for its own needs. While China’s oil futures are a wakeup call to the US, they are still a dice toss.

  Additionally, Germany is another country that is rediscovering the value of gold. The Deutsche Bundesbank has recently recalled $28 billion worth of gold previously stored in New York and Paris back to Frankfurt.

  The National Bank of Hungary has called back 100,000 ounces of gold back to its Budapest reserves in an effort to strengthen its own market. Other central banks have followed suit. There is a global interest in keeping gold reserves close to home in the event of upheaval in the geopolitical situation.

  At this point, it is unknown whether Congressman Mooney’s bill to reinstate the gold standard will pass. What is certain is that the global interest in gold continues to take off. In bettor’s terms, gold is the last ace in the hole for global currency stability.

  

• Police Foil Murder-For-Hire Plot After Woman Paid $10K In Bitcoin Over The Dark Web

  And just like that, yet another murder-for-hire plot involving bitcoin has been foiled.

  A Chicago TV  station is reporting that a nurse from the city’s northwest suburbs named Tina Jones has been charged with solicitation of murder-for-hire after trying to use the dark web to hire a company to murder the wife of a man she had an affair with.

  Jones appeared in bond court Wednesday morning where a judge set her bond at $250,000. On April 12, Woodridge, Ill. police received a tip that a woman was the subject of a murder-for-hire plot. Police said that in January 2018, Jones paid the dark web company $10,000 via bitcoin to have a woman murdered.

  

  Jones turned herself in after a warrant was issued.

  Jones is scheduled to appear in court on May 15. If convicted, she faces a minimum sentence of 20 years in prison.

  Prosecutors said Jones gave very specific orders.

  “This woman not only paid over $10,000, but she left specific instructions on the website as to when the woman’s husband would be at work, so they would know when this woman would be alone,” Berlin said. “She left instructions not to hurt the husband and also to make it look like it was an accident.”

  Of course, longtime followers of the pioneering cryptocurrency will remember that the founder of the Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht received his life without parole sentence largely because he “hired” what turned out to be an undercover federal agent to carry out a hit on an associate Ulbricht had suspected of turning on him.

  

• The World's First Trillionaire Will Be A Space Miner

  Authored by Michael Kern via SafeHaven.com,

  Famous astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and Goldman Sachs share a common belief: The next trillion-dollar industry will be in the mining sector – in outer space.  

  

  As Neil deGrasse Tyson puts it:

  “The first trillionaire there will ever be is the person who exploits the natural resources on asteroids. There’s this vast universe of limitless energy and limitless resources. I look at wars fought over access to resources. That could be a thing of the past, once space becomes our backyard.”

  While the renowned astrophysicist sees the potential for peace, Goldman Sachs sees the radical arrival of a trillion-dollar mining industry in the 21st Century.

  

  It may sound like a long-term gamble, but Goldman has been eyeing improvements in technology and the trends toward lowers costs for manufacturing spacecraft.

  

  A year ago, Goldman noted in a 98-page report:

  “While the psychological barrier to mining asteroids is high, the actual financial and technological barriers are far lower. Prospecting probes can likely be built for tens of millions of dollars each and Caltech has suggested an asteroid-grabbing spacecraft could cost $2.6bn.”

  So, science fiction is becoming the narrative of reality, and radical opinions are starting to seem rather sober.

  All the more because the whole idea is being given a major boost in Luxembourg of all places.

  Asteroid mining is being led by private sector interests that are dead set on making money in outer space.

  Two of the leading companies formed with this in mind are California-based Deep Space Industries and Washington-based Planetary Resources. Both have been operating for several years, and both plan on profiting from asteroid mining.

  But the tiny European country of Luxembourg is hoping to become the hub of cosmic mining—a tax haven banking center-turned-asteroid-exploiter. So it’s no mystery why Deep Space Industries, for instance, has offices both in Luxembourg as well and a partnership with the government of Luxembourg.

  Luxembourg is home to a few communication satellite companies and has a similar asteroid mining law to the U.S. law, which makes the small nation an attractive alternative to the U.S. market. This European country sees massive opportunity and plans to be way ahead of the game.

  “Our goal is to put into place an overall framework for the exploration and commercial use of resources from ‘celestial bodies’ such as asteroids, or from the moon,” said Etienne Schneider, Luxembourg’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy.

  Once a famous steel producer, an experienced commercial satellite hub, and now famed for private banking and low-tax base, Luxembourg’s mining and financial backgrounds make it a prime candidate for the race to cosmic natural resources.

  The first European private satellite operator, Société Européenne des Satellites, was launched in 1985 and today it’s the second-biggest commercial satellite operator in the world.

  Luxembourg started working on an asteroid mining bill since 2016 that came into force last year, giving companies ownership over whatever, they extract from celestial bodies. This law is very similar to Obama’s law signed in 2015, which also gives mining companies the right to keep their cosmic loot.

  Both laws also take advantage of a loophole in the United Nation’s Outer Space Treaty, which states that nations can’t claim and occupy the moon and other celestial bodies—but it doesn’t say anything about what’s extracted from them.  

  There won’t be any ownership of asteroids, either.

  The only difference between these laws is that in the case of Luxembourg, companies don’t have to be based in the country in order to enjoy protection. An office will suffice.

  Luxembourg established the Space Resources initiative in 2016 and earmarked $223 million of its national space budget to provide early-stage funding and grants to companies working toward space mining.

  Deep Space Industries and Planetary Resources are already working closely with Luxembourg’s government, which contributed an undisclosed amount of R&D funding to Deep Space Industries and struck a deal with Planetary Resources in 2016 for a $28 million investment in exchange for undisclosed equity in the company.

  While there may be limitless natural resources from asteroid mining, as deGrasse Tyson notes, the first commercial commodity is likely to be precious water.

  It may be decades before anyone actually starts ‘fracking’ an asteroid and delivering new natural resources, but when it happens, Luxembourg will have secured its place on the space map as a definitive hub.

  

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