Oct 21

Today’s News 21st October 2016

  • Unraveling The Aleppo / Mosul Riddle

    Submitted by Pepe Escobar via Stratgic-Culture.org,

    There’s no question Baghdad needs to take back Mosul from ISIS/ISIL/Daesh. It could not do it before. In theory, the time is now.

    The real question is the conflicting motivations of the large “who’s who” doing it; the Iraqi Army’s 9th Division; the Kurdish Peshmerga, under the baton of wily, corrupt opportunist Barzani; Sunni tribal lords; tens of thousands of Shi’ite militias from southern Iraq; operational “support” from US Special Forces; “targeted” bombing by the US Air Force; and lurking in the background, Turkish Special Forces and air power.

    Now that’s a certified recipe for trouble.

    Much like Aleppo, Mosul is – literally – the stuff of legend. The successor of ancient Nineveh, settled 8000 years ago; former capital of the Assyrian Empire under Sennacherib in the 7th century B.C.; conquered by Babylon in the 6th century B.C.; a thousand years later, annexed to the Muslim empire and ruled by the Umayyads and the Abbasids; the key hub, from the 11th to the 12th century, of the Atabegs medieval state; a key Ottoman hub in a 16th century post-Silk Road spanning the Indian Ocean all the way to the Persian Gulf, the Tigris valley, Aleppo and Tripoli in the Mediterranean.

    After WWI, everyone craved Mosul – from Turkey to France. But it was the Brits who managed to dupe France into letting Mosul be annexed to the British Empire’s brand new colony: Iraq. Then came the long Arab nationalist Ba’ath party domination. And afterwards, Shock and Awe and hell; the US invasion and occupation; the tumultuous Shi’ite-majority government of Nouri al-Maliki in Baghdad; and the ISIS/ISIL/Daesh takeover in the summer of 2014.

    Mosul’s historic parallels could not but have a special flavor. That 11th/12th century medieval state happened to have roughly the same borders of Daesh’s phony “Caliphate” – incorporating both Aleppo and Mosul. In 2004, Mosul was de facto ruled by disgraced, failed “presidential material” Gen. David Petraeus. Ten years later, after Petraeus’s phony “surge”, Mosul was ruled by a phony Caliphate born in a US prison near the Kuwaiti border.

    Since then, hundreds of thousands of residents fled Mosul. The population may be as much as halved compared to the original 2 million. That’s a mighty lot to be properly “liberated”.

    Aleppo “falls”

    The hegemonic narrative about the ongoing Battle of (East) Aleppo is that an “axis of evil” (as coined by Hillary Clinton) of Russia, Iran and “the Syrian regime” is relentlessly bombing innocent civilians and “moderate rebels” while causing a horrendous humanitarian crisis.

    In fact, the absolute majority of these several thousand-strong “moderate rebels” is in fact incorporated and/or affiliated with Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (Conquest of Syria Front), which happens to be none other than Jabhat al-Nusra, a.k.a. al-Qaeda in Syria, alongside a smatter of other jihadi groups such as Ahrar al-Sham (Al-Nusra’s goals – and who supports them – are fully documented here).

    Meanwhile, few civilians remain trapped in eastern Aleppo – arguably no more than 30,000 or 40,000 out of an initial population of 300,000.

    And that brings us to the crux of the matter explaining the Pentagon sabotage of the Russia-US ceasefire; those fits of rage by Samantha Batshit Crazy Power; the non-stop spin that Russia is committing “war crimes”.

    If Damascus controls, apart from the capital, Aleppo, Homs, Hama and Latakia, it controls the Syria that matters; 70% of the population and all the important industrial/business centers. It’s practically game over. The rest is a rural, nearly empty back of beyond.

    For the headless chicken school of foreign policy currently practiced by the lame duck Obama administration, the ceasefire was a means to buy time and rearm what the Beltway describes as “moderate rebels”. Yet even that was too much for the Pentagon, which faces a determined Syria/Iran/Russia alliance fighting all declinations of demented Salafi-jihadis, whatever their terminology, and committed to keep a unitary Syria.

    So reconquering the whole of Aleppo has to be the top priority for Damascus, Tehran and Moscow. The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) will never have enough military to reconquer the rural, ultra hardcore Sunni back of beyond. Damascus may also never reconquer the Kurdish northeast, the embryonic Rojava; after all the YPG is directly backed by the Pentagon. Whether an independent Rojava will ever see the light of day is an interminable future issue to be solved.

    The SAA, once again, is tremendously overextended. Thus, the method to reconquer East Aleppo is indeed hardcore. There is a humanitarian crisis. There is collateral damage. And this is only the beginning. Because sooner or later the SAA, supported by Hezbollah and Iraqi Shi’ite militias, will have to reconquer East Aleppo with boots on the ground as well – supported by Russian fighter jets.

    The heart of the matter is that the former “Free Syrian Army”, absorbed by al-Qaeda in Syria and other Salafi-jihadis, is about to lose East Aleppo. Regime change and/or “Assad must go” – the military way – in Damascus is now impossible. Thus the utter desperation exhibited by the Pentagon’s Ash “Empire of Whining” Carter, neocon cells implanted all across lame duck Team Obama, and their hordes of media shills.

    Enter Plan B; the Battle of Mosul.

    Fallujah remixed?

    The Pentagon plan is deceptively simple; erase any signs of Damascus and the SAA east of Palmyra. And this is where the Battle of Mosul converges with the recent Pentagon attack on Deir Ezzor. Even if we have an offensive in the next few months against Raqqa – by the YPG Kurds or even by Turkish forces – we still have a “Salafist principality” from eastern Syria to western Iraq all mapped up, exactly as the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) was planning (dreaming?) in 2012.

    London-based Syrian historian Nizar Nayouf, as well as unnamed diplomatic sources, have confirmed that Washington and Riyadh closed a deal to let thousands of phony Caliphate jihadis escape Mosul from the west, as long as they head straight to Syria. A look at the battle map tells us that Mosul is encircled from all directions, except west.

    But what about Sultan Erdogan in all this? He’s been spinning that Turkish Special Forces will enter Mosul just as they entered Jarablus in the Turkish-Syrian border; without firing a shot, when the city will be cleaned of jihadis.

    Meanwhile, Ankara is preparing its spectacular entrance in the battlefield, with Erdogan in full regalia shooting at random. For him, “Baghdad” is no more than “an administrator of an army composed of Shi’ites”; and the YPG Kurds “will be removed from the Syrian town of Manbij” after the Mosul operation. Not to mention that Ankara and Washington are actively discussing the offensive against Raqqa, as Erdogan has not abandoned his dream of a “safe zone” of 5,000 km in northern Syria.

    In a nutshell; for Erdogan, Mosul is a sideshow. His priorities remain a fractured, fragmented Syria, “safe zone” included; and to smash the YPG Kurds (while working side by side with the Peshmerga in Iraq).

    As far as the US Plan B is concerned, Hezbollah’s Sheikh Nasrallah has clearly seen through the whole scheme; “The Americans intend to repeat the Fallujah plot when they opened a way for ISIL to escape towards eastern Syria before the Iraqi warplanes targeted the terrorists’ convoy.” He added that “the Iraqi army and popular forces” must defeat ISIS/ISIL/Daesh in Mosul; otherwise, they will have to chase them out across eastern Syria.

    It's also no wonder that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has also clearly seen The Big Picture: “As far as I know, the city is not fully encircled. I hope it’s because they simply couldn’t do it, not because they wouldn’t do it. But this corridor poses a risk that Islamic State fighters could flee from Mosul and go to Syria.”

    It’s clear Moscow won’t sit idly by if that’s the case;“I hope the US-led coalition, which is actively engaged in the operation to take Mosul, will take it into account.”

    Of course Mosul – even more than Aleppo – poses a serious humanitarian question.

    The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) estimates as many as 1 million people may be affected. Lavrov goes straight to the point when he insists “neither Iraq nor its neighbors currently have the capacity to accommodate such a large number of refugees, and this should have been a factor in the planning of the Mosul operation.”

    It may not have been. After all, for the “US-led” (from behind?) coalition, the number one priority is to ensure the phony Caliphate survives, somewhere in eastern Syria. Over 15 years after 9/11, the song remains the same, with the war on terra the perennial gift that keeps on giving.

  • "Dear Janet"? – China Devalues Most Since August, Yuan Tumbles To Lowest Since Sept 2010

    For the 10th day of the last 11, onshore yuan has weakened against the dollar. A 0.35% devaluation of the Yuan fix – the most since August – catching down to offshore Yuan's weakness, suggests (for now) PBOC policy is 'allowing' the drop and perhaps sending yet another 'turmoil-induing' message to The Fed as their hawkishness grows.

    Since the start of Golden Week, yuan has plunged…

     

    Plunging Yuan back near pre-peg-break levels from Sept 2010…

     

    Sending a message?

  • David Rosenberg Calls For A Multi-Trillion, "Helicopter Money" Stimulus Package

    With the inherent weakness in US GDP and the rising probability of a recession (two weeks ago Bank of America modeled that the next recession would likely start roughly one year from now), Gluskin Sheff’s David Rosenberg thinks that with monetary options exhausted it will take a fiscal boost in the trillions of dollars to kickstart the economy. These issues were discussed in an extended interview with Real Vision TV, where the chief economist and strategist at Gluskin Sheff proposed some radical policies to engineer the growth needed in nominal income. 

    His ideas, some of which can be seen here in a clip of the interview, include helicopter money attached to a $2 trillion perpetual bond, massive infrastructure spending and measures to tackle the $1 trillion student debt load that has seriously hamstrung the economy.

    Here are some of the interview highlights:

    Doing the Same Thing Over Again and Expecting a Different Outcome

    Whether the US will in fact experience the technical definition of a recession is a matter of fervent debate, with the odds something like 20%-30%, according to Rosenberg (60% according to Deutsche Bank), but with growth averaging around 1%, there is no doubt the economy is weak.

    “There are some people saying a recession is here right now,” Rosenberg says, “I don’t think that we meet those conditions yet. But people say, well, look. Twelve months in a row of negative year on year industrial production, that’s never happened outside recession, check. We’ve had now going into six quarters of profit contraction, year over year. That’s only happened in the context of a recession, check. I mean, all that is true, but so much of this has been related to the oil shock that we had.”

    Rosenberg’s problem with monetary policy, now in its 7th year of unorthodox experimentation, is that it has become a weak antidote to structural problems in the economy (even if it is still quite potent at boosting financial asets). Fiscal policy on the other hand, if constructed right, could be the answer due to its very powerful multiplier impact. “I can’t say that I know for sure, but it’s the old Einstein adage about the definition of insanity,” Rosenberg said. “And we’re finding that we’re really– if we’re not hitting the wall on monetary policy, we’re certainly seeing classic economics 101 of the law of diminishing returns.”

    In terms of infrastructure spending, he said that one lesson from recent history and the Great Recession is that you’ve got to have the credibility to convince people that this is going to be permanent and not temporary, in terms of the impact on the economy. “So it can’t be transitory. It’s got to be very big. With interest rates as low as they are, there’s certainly the capacity. I mean, you’ve got a lot of governments around the world issuing 50 or 100-year bonds. So this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to borrow money.”

    A Couple of Trillion Dollars of Helicopter Money

    While companies have been taking advantage of these conditions to borrow money, the funds have not been invested in the real economy. Share buybacks have become more popular, while personal savings rates have increased amid the economic uncertainty. This all boils down to a big case for government spending, with monetary policy joining forces with fiscal policy in the form of helicopter money.

    “What you do with helicopter money is you finance it off the central bank’s balance sheet because we’re talking doing something very dramatic to reflate the economy,” Rosenberg said. “It’s not a few hundred billion dollars. It’s a couple of trillion…I know I’ll get accused of bailing out the sinners, but, my lord, we’ve already done that. I mean, nobody went to jail.”

    One of the things holding the economy back is the $1 trillion student debt load, which he said has left 35% of males aged 18 to 34 living with mom and dad, not getting jobs and not becoming first time home buyers. Employment growth for the 65s and over is 7%, meanwhile, as the aging boomers have to work longer because they didn’t save enough for retirement. 

    “Helicopter money is QE plus where, say, the treasury issues a perpetual– call it, like, a century bond, a $2 trillion bond on the Fed’s balance sheet. And so when that bond matures, it’s, like, we’re all dead in the long run at that point. And then the Treasury can use that money to stimulate growth. “

    The beauty of this idea, according to Rosenberg is that you don’t have to go through Congress, with such difficulty in achieving corporate or personal tax reform.  “It would lead to a permanent increase in the monetary base. Inflation expectations would go up, which means that real interest rates would go negative. And the theory is that that would provide a bigger thrust towards getting what we all want, which is sustainable and accelerating nominal income growth.“

    Real Risk of Fed Mistakes or Trump Trade War

    Sustainable and accelerating nominal GDP is certainly what’s required while the risk persists that we could be shocked into recession, or the Fed could make a mistake in raising interest rates too aggressively.

    “That’s what happened in December of last year. They raised rates 25 basis points, but the overall financial tightening, in terms of what it meant for the dollar or in credit spreads and the stock market, it was really, like, 75 basis points of tightening. And the next thing you know, the economy slows to stall speed.“

    Another concern for investors is the prospect of a Trump presidency, bringing with it the potential start of a trade war. That could provide the sort of exogenous shock to cause the economy to go into recession, Rosenberg stated, noting that historically all the recessions in the post war period have been created by the Fed.

    “The problem is that when you have the economy running on average 1% growth, or 1% plus, which is not a big cushion. And so, you know, it’s a complicated question to try and handicap a recession on us right now. There’s a lot of people out there that are convinced that a recession is coming.”

    To watch the full interview with David Rosenberg, visit Real Vision TV.  You can access this and many more interviews with a free trial. 

    * * *

    Oh, if Rosenberg’s idea gets traction – and execution –  which it will eventually, as we have said since our first days in 2009, buy lots and lots of gold.

  • For The First Time In 2016, Junk Bond Defaults Are Decelerating

    Earlier this week, we pointed out that we have now anniversaried the low print of oil and gas prices from 2015, and going forward the “base effect” will kick in, sending headline inflation higher, and maybe even sharply higher if oil continues its ascent into the Vienna OPEC meeting. Perhaps an even more interesting base effect was pointed out earlier today by Goldman, which points out that after climbing in virtually linear fashion all year, corporate defaults – particularly in the energy sector – have started to decline for the first time.

    As readers will recall, going into the year, many market participants expressed concerns about the outlook for defaults and downgrades. The fear was that the weak state of corporate balance sheets could cause defaults and downgrades in the Energy and Metals and Mining sectors to spill over into the broader market, especially if corporations continue to struggle to generate organic growth. And while this story is certainly not over yet, it appears that at lest for the time being between the latest – and biggest yet – burst in global central bank liquidity, and rising oil prices, even the most inefficient and leveraged companies appear to have gotten a reprieve for the moment, or as Goldman puts it, “beyond the limited contagion to the broader market, there is also mounting evidence that a gradual recovery in HY defaults and downgrades within commodities-exposed sectors is underway.”

    What this means is that as the chart below shows, for the first time this year, HY defaults have decelerated, especially amongst Metals and Mining and Energy issuers where default risk has been heavily concentrated.

    HY ex-Energy default rate at post-crisis lows, limited spillover
    12-month trailing issuer-weighted HY ex-Energy and Metals and Mining default rate

    The 12-month trailing default rate declined to 5.40% in September after climbing through most of 2016 and peaking at 5.71% in August, according to issuer-weighted data collected from Moody’s. And with commodities sectors accounting for nearly three quarters of the total defaulted debt over the past year, the improvement in the Energy and Metals and Mining default trend remains central to the gradual recovery for the HY market overall. In fact, not a single Metals and Mining issuer has defaulted since May, while the monthly default frequency has also slowed down meaningfully for Energy issuers since July, as shown in the next chart below.

    As Goldman puts it, “this is a welcome change after defaults amongst Energy producers escalated with rapid intensity from 1.27% at the beginning of 2015 to all-time highs at 29% in August, when using monthly-refreshed cohorts.” And now, the default cycle is shifting back into reverse, at least until the next and perhaps bigger oil price shock.

    It is, however, very bad news for Saudi Arabia and OPEC, as it means that the peak balance sheet pressure facing US shale companies has now passed, and together with those companies which have restructured, and come out of bankrupty without a debt overhang, there is now a smooth runway for much more crude production in the coming months, something which will lead to even greater record output in the near future and ultimately – once supply and demand again matter – far lower prices and the cycle can begin afresh.

  • US 'Relocated' ISIS Terrorists Out Of Iraq, Into Syria To Fight Assad

    Submitted by Vaughan Famularo via TheDuran.com,

    As the Iraqi military with US support closes in on Mosul it is becoming clear that the US plan is to transfer the ISIS troops defending the city to Syria as part of the regime change plan there.

    The Russian news media RIA Novosti, has revealed that US and Saudi leaders have decided to allow the safe passage of 9000 ISIS terrorists to vacate Mosul in Iraq and, relocate into Syria.

    The surprising information was leaked by an anonymous diplomatic source. It was also claimed that this decision was conditional on the terrorists agreeing to fight Syrian and Russian troops in Palmyra and Deir Ezzor.

    In the past two weeks we have witnessed the chaotic musing within the US Political and diplomatic corps once their impotence was exposed in Syria due to the collapse of the ceasefire and, the resumption of hostilities in Aleppo.

     

    The bedlam and frustration exhibited by Western leaders has been apparent to all with wild claims of possible shooting down of Russian jets in Syria and, the continued ache and longing for the implementation of their, No Fly Zone.

    Despite the turbulent political rumblings and threats, Russia and the government of Syria have steadfastly worked to free eastern Aleppo from the remaining terrorists who are now surrounded there.

    The decision to allow ISIS to flee safely into Syria once again reveals to the world the gloved hand that shepherds and steers these terrorists.

    The bombing of Syrian Army soldiers in Deir Ezzor by US and coalition Jets now appear purposed and calculated rather than an accident claimed by the US.

    To add to the controversy, what was generally unreported in the media was a further attack a few days later that destroyed the last two surviving bridges spanning the Euphrates River.

    Their destruction, will isolate the Syrian forces stationed at Deir Ezzor and, make life more difficult for the Syrian people who are already wearing the burden of six years at war.

    As the ISIS terrorists leave Mosul and travel into Syria their objectives are the recently freed city of Palmyra, and the brave city of Deir Ezzor. Whether their safe passage from Mosul includes US and Saudi cover into Syria remains a mystery.

    Regardless their location in eastern Syria allows their masters the tactical advantage of mobilising these proxy forces at the time of their choosing in their ultimate goal of deposing Syrian President Assad.

  • Jill Stein Slams Hillary Clinton's Foreign Policy As "Scarier Than Trump's"

    Submitted by SM Gibson via TheAntiMedia.org,

    The Green Party nominee for president of the United States, Jill Stein, has begun matter-of-factly speaking out against the foreign policy agenda of one of her political opponents, Hillary Clinton.

    Dr. Stein, who has strongly advocated for a more peaceful approach to U.S. relations in the Middle East — as well as throughout the world — recently took to her Twitter account to boldly state what may come as a shock to many Americans:

    “Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy is much scarier than Donald Trump’s.”

    The presidential candidate also tweeted the words of her running mate, Ajamu Baraka, who said, “It should [be] clear to everyone that a vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote for war.”

     

    Dr. Stein elaborated on her social media statements when asked by a reporter in Texas this week what she felt a Hillary Clinton presidency would look like.

    “Well, we know what kind of Secretary of State she was,” Stein said in her response. “[Hillary] is in incredible service to Wall Street and to the war profiteers. She led the way in Libya and she’s trying to start an air war with Russia over Syria, which means, if Hillary gets elected, we’re kinda going to war with Russia, folks…a nuclear-armed power.” 

    While many Americans act as if one’s disdain for Hillary Clinton and her policies automatically make them a supporter of Donald Trump for president — or vice versa — Stein went on to vocalize her fear of both major party candidates.

    “Who will sleep well with Trump in the White House? But you shouldn’t sleep well with Hillary in the White House either. Fortunately, we live in a democracy and we have more than two deadly choices,” Stein said, referring to herself and Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson.

    Regrettably for Americans, Stein is right about the Democratic nominee. Those concerned about the future of America with someone as erratic as Donald Trump in the Oval Office are justified in their worry, but to believe Hillary is somehow a “better option” is not only a naive assumption — but a reckless one. A vote for Hillary is undoubtedly a conscious vote to go war with a nuclear-armed superpower.

    Still not a believer? Watch the video below and see for yourself:

  • The End State: 5 Triggering Events That Would Place The U.S. Under Martial Law

    Submitted by Mac Slavo via SHTFPlan.com,

    This article was originally published by Jeremiah Johnson at Tess Pennington’s ReadyNutrition.com

    martial-law-2

    As you are probably well aware, the Obama administration would like nothing more than to place the United States under Martial Law.

    Once that is accomplished, the country and people would be locked down and kept under control on the pretext of continuing with the government and/or maintaining the national security of the U.S.

    Let’s take a look at 5 events the administration would be most likely to utilize to reach this end state.

    Note: All of these can occur simultaneously, successively, or individually in any combination at any time: there is no limit to their use or potential to recur!

    1. Economic Meltdown

    Over the course of this past year, we have seen a tremendous amount of volatility in trade (international) and the U.S.’s domestic manufacturing base.  As our fragile economy is based on 75% of consumer spending, any significant downturn that keeps the shoppers home can lead to disastrous reports.  Lower consumer spending means people do not buy goods and services beyond the absolute essentials, and worse: (in the government’s eyes) they hoard money and withdraw their funds from bank accounts.

    The Baltic Dry Index (BDI) can be seen as a key indicator of raw goods and materials transported to manufacturers and consumers via shipping contracts.  As mentioned in previous articles, Hanjinn Container Company, the7th largest container corporation in the world just filed for bankruptcy over the summer.  You can see the BDI fluctuations day by day when you visit http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/BDIY:IND.  It has been fluctuating wildly over the past year.

    Deutsche Bank is on the verge of bankruptcy and large banks such as Bank of Americaand J.P. Morgan have been plagued by losses and lawsuits alike.  The unemployment rate is truly about 25% and the “Soviet” style statistics quacked from the radio on “record gains” and “economic improvements” are false and intentionally misleading.  A “Bank Holiday”has already happened in places such as Indianapolis, and when the politicians, bankers, and oligarchs decide, they will pull the plug on a Federal Reserve system of fiat currency that is already an ineffective laughingstock of a smirking world that is steadily returning to the gold standard.  When that Bank Holiday is declared, you can be sure the financial systems will collapse and Martial Law will be waiting in the wings.

    2. Cyberattack

    This one is definitely one of the administration’s favorites.  We’ve been seeing signs of this with the DHS (Department of Homeland Security) and DNI (Director of National Intelligence) letters and statements that the Russian government is hacking into the American electoral and election process.  The “targeting” of the DNC (Democratic National Convention) e-mails was assigned to the Russians and officially the Russian government has been accused by the administration of such, and trying to influence the presidential race on Friday, 10/14/16.

    We also saw on 9/7/16, two days before the 5th North Korean nuclear test, the corporation based in California that monitors North Korean missile launches and nuclear testing was hacked into.  A DoS (Denial of Service) was placed into their computer systems, preventing them from uploading satellite feeds and photos that would have enabled them to monitor the North Korean launch.  That corporation is the Project on Crowdsourced Satellite Imagery.  You can read more about this in the article “DoS Attack Crashes Website Monitoring North Korea’s Nuclear Test Site,” by Eric Niiler of Wired.com.

    If other governments can crash our internet and servers, do you think it is possible that the U.S. government as directed by the Obama administration can do it on its own? 

    When that occurs, cell phones will go down, the computers will go down, the financial markets will be in a turmoil and cease trading, and ATM’s and bank cards will be rendered useless.  Transportation, inventories, shipping, and deliveries will all be thrown into a turmoil and come to a halt.  For an excellent description of this, read Mac Slavo’s article fromSHTFplan.com entitled “When the Trucking Stops,” that shows how vulnerable our nation’s supply lines are.  Bottom line: if all of this goes down as a result of a cyberattack, Martial Law will immediately follow.

    3. “Unforeseeable/Black Swan” Event

    As of last week, Obama just signed an Executive Order (EO), entitled “Executive Order: Coordinating Efforts to Prepare the Nation for Space Weather Events,” signed10/13/2016.  Such an EO could cover meteor strikes, Coronal Mass Ejections (CME’s) from the sun, a comet, or any other space anomaly.  Not a big deal, you may think?  It is a big deal, because here’s the bottom line:

    Who is to prevent Obama from either causing another nation to launch an EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) weapon, or launching one of his own (U.S.-made weapon), taking down the grid and subsequently blaming it on a CME event/solar storm, courtesy of the sun?

    Other events would include potentially man-made or generated storms, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, or even volcanic activity.  If one scoffs at such, remember all that it would need is a 1 megaton nuclear “kicker” to set off either Yellowstone Caldera or the San Andreas Fault.  Such natural disasters (initiated by man or genuine) usually result in Martial Law at the state level on a regular basis, much less one that is national in scope…that Obama would jump on to inculcate Martial Law.

    4. Nuclear War/EMP Attack

    Any day we could be at war with North Korea, Iran, China, or Russia.  The resulting devastation, whether a full-scale or a limited nuclear war would automatically set in motion the wheels for COG (Continuity of Government), and a declaration of Martial Law.

    Let me close this portion with my caveat:

    World War III will begin with the detonation of an EMP device or weapon over the continental United States, followed by a limited nuclear exchange and then conventional warfare.

    5. Viral or Bacterial Pandemic

    Either naturally-occurring, or man-made.  The CDC (Centers for Disease Control) just inherited a tremendous amount of “police power” over the summer regarding their newfound ability to quarantine individuals or large groups of people on the suspicion of contamination/communicability regarding viral or bacterial pathogens relating to a potential or real pandemic.

    There is an article by Catherine J. Frompovich entitled “ALERT: U.S. CDC Giving Itself Unconstitutional Powers to Round Up and Detain Citizens En masse Anytime, Anywhere and Throw Away the Key,” dated on 9/3/16.  This article details how these police powers were created in the Federal Register as the Proposed Rule “Control of Communicable Diseases” on August 15, 2016 that are now in effect to be found underFederal Register Number: 2016-18103.  Guess what?  That proposed rule is now law, and could easily be utilized to “justify” Martial Law in the U.S. because of a pandemic: naturally-occurring, man-made, or phony.

    In addition to all of these juicy tidbits, the deciding factor is what I refer to as the “IHM,” or “Incredible Human Mob.”  Yes, Civil Unrest is a factor; yet it is not a method but a “sign/symptom,” a “side-effect” of what happens when one of the aforementioned 5 methods are employed.  “In the interests of public safety,” or “to protect the public,” or “to maintain law and order” are the phrases trumpeted by our benevolent and friendly government.

    As Rahm Emmanuel said, “Never let a crisis go to waste,” the very ones who are to be protected (the public) are the ones who create the conditions for civil unrest.  It’s literally a “problem that takes care of itself,” and here’s the bottom line to cover the Civil Unrest factor:

    Using the fake justification “in the interests of the safety of the people,” martial law will be declared to confine, restrict, and control the people…protecting them from…themselves.

    Then come the restrictions to travel, the police state in the streets, at the workplace, and the confiscation of firearms.  Then comes the removal of “dissidents and potential troublemakers,” as well as the curfews, restrictions, and limitations in every facet of our society.  Martial Law is an objective of the Obama administration.  The problem is that he (Obama) cannot just arbitrarily declare it.  The declaration requires a prod, such as one of the 5 methods mentioned.  In those circumstances, he then can suspend our rights under the Constitution and bypass the true laws of the U.S.  Such an end state is his desire.  Such an end state would also mean the end…of the United States.

  • Dead. Voter. Walking.

    Thursday humor?

     

    Source: Townhall.com

  • Wikileaks Taunts Democrats, Tweets "It Has A Surprise In Store" For Tim Kaine And Donna Brazile

    First, earlier this afternoon, Wikileaks surprised observers when its released in addition to the daily trove of Podesta email, a handful of what appear to be emails sent from Obama’s heretofore secret email adress; then, moments ago, in a tweet that suggests the vendetta between Julian Assange – who we now know is being pressured by the Ecuadorian government in its London embassy under notice from the US State Department –  and Democrats has goten serious, Wikileaks tweeted that “we have a surprise in store for Tim Kaine and Donna Brazile.”

    … and then it retweeted NBC reported Kailani Koenig who said that “[Tim] Kaine’s been saying hacked Wikileaks emails might not be accurate, so asked him whether he had any examples or had heard if one wasn’t real”, to which he responded “I read of one example yesterday but I can’t pin down which one it was.”

    * * *

    Prior to tweeting this, the Wikileaks twitter account mocked Hillary’s statement that 17 agencies have confirmed Russia hacked the US when it said that Hillary Clinton’s  “17 US intelligence agencies” include:
    Coast Guard, DEA, Navel Intelligence, Department of Energy, Air Force recon, and then added that “Clinton’s “17 US intelligence agencies” may be the biggest, most immediately disprovable wopper ever intentionally made during a debate.”

    It is now quite clear that it has gotten very personal between Assange and Clinton, and if the latter is elected president in less than 3 weeks, that drone strike on Julian which Hillary does not remember “joking about”, may suddenly materialize.

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