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India Joins China in Backing Russia Over Ukraine Escalation

“Submitted by Zachary Zeck via The Diplomat,

On Thursday a senior Indian official appeared to endorse Russia’s position in Ukraine in recent days, even as Delhi urged all parties involved to seek a peaceful resolution to the diplomatic crisis.

When asked for India’s official assessment of the events in Ukraine, National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon responded:

“We hope that whatever internal issues there are within Ukraine are settled peacefully, and the broader issues of reconciling various interests involved, and there are legitimate Russian and other interests involved…. We hope those are discussed, negotiated and that there is a satisfactory resolution to them.”

The statement was made on the same day that Crimea’s parliament voted to hold a referendum for secession from Ukraine.

Local Indian media noted that Menon’s statement about Russia’s legitimate interests in Ukraine made it the first major nation to publicly lean toward Russia. As my colleague Shannon has reported throughout the week, many of China’s public statements could be interpreted as backing Russia in Ukraine, despite Beijing’s own concerns about ethnic breakaway states and its principle of non-interference.

However, at other times, including at the UN Security Council, Beijing has appeared to be subtly rebuking Moscow by suggesting that its unilateral path threatened regional and global stability. At the very least, however, Beijing has characteristically not gone as far as the U.S. and the West in publicly scolding Vladimir Putin for the military intervention in Crimea.

Ukraine certainly appeared to interpret India’s endorsement of Russia’s legitimate interests as far more hostile than Beijing’s position on Russia’s actions. According to the Telegraph India, a Ukrainian embassy spokesperson stationed in Delhi responded to Menon’s comments by saying: “We are not sure how Russia can be seen having legitimate interests in the territory of another country. In our view, and in the view of much of the international community, this is a direct act of aggression and we cannot accept any justification for it.”

The larger question, of course, is why India decided to take such a relatively pro-Russian stance on the Ukraine issue? There are a number of possibilities….”

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MSM Finally Decides to Report the News in the Ukraine

The question now is who backed said nationalist right wingned neo nazi fascists?

“(Reuters) – When protest leaders in Ukraine helped oust a president widely seen as corrupt, they became heroes of the barricades. But as they take places in the country’s new government, some are facing uncomfortable questions about their own values and associations, not least alleged links to neo-fascist extremists.

Russia’s president Vladimir Putin claims Ukraine has fallen into the hands of far-right fascist groups, and some Western experts have also raised concerns about the influence of extremists. Yet many Ukrainians see the same groups as nationalist stalwarts and defenders of the country’s independence.

Two of the groups under most scrutiny are Svoboda, whose members hold five senior roles in Ukraine’s new government including the post of deputy prime minister, and Pravyi Sector (Right Sector), whose leader Dmytro Yarosh is now the country’s Deputy Secretary of National Security.

Right Sector activists wearing black ski masks, bullet-proof vests and military fatigues still hold several buildings close to Kiev’s Independence Square. Activists on the street declined to speak to Reuters about their organization. An individual described as their “commander” directed a reporter to two spokespeople who also declined requests for interviews.

On Tuesday the group called for supporters to patrol Wikipedia. In a posting on Vkontakte, the Russian equivalent of Facebook, Right Sector wrote: “We appeal to people who can make changes to Wikipedia. In the English version (with Russian worse) Right Sector is depicted as an organization that has a fascist and neo-Nazi views, with appropriate consequences. If you have an opportunity – correct this misunderstanding.”

According to Wikipedia’s logs, on Monday the Right Sector entry described the party as having “borderline fascist or neo-fascist views.” On Tuesday the page was modified 174 times, including changes to describe Right Sector as an “organization to protect demonstrators” and a “youth patriot organization.”

After the intervention of Wikipedia administrators, the page was locked and reverted to saying that Right Sector was “described by major Western newspapers as having far right or neo-fascist views.”

Expert opinions on Svoboda in particular are divided. Per Anders Rudling, an associate professor at Lund University in Sweden and researcher on Ukrainian extremists, has described Svoboda as “neo-fascist”. He told Britain’s Channel 4 News: “Two weeks ago I could never have predicted this. A neo-fascist party like Svoboda getting the deputy prime minister position is news in its own right.”

But Ivan Katchanovski, a political scientist at the University of Ottawa who has studied the far-right in Ukraine, disagreed that Svoboda was so extreme. “Svoboda is currently best described as a radical nationalist party, and not as fascist or neo-Nazi,” he said. “It is now not overtly anti-Semitic.”….”

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Natty Gas Fracking Now Linked to Man Made Earthquakes

“One of Oklahoma’s biggest man-made earthquakes, caused by fracking-linked wastewater injection, triggered an earthquake cascade that led to the damaging magnitude-5.7 Prague quake that struck on Nov. 6, 2011, a new study confirms.

The findings suggest that even small man-made earthquakes, such as those of just a magnitude 1 or magnitude 2, can trigger damaging quakes, said study co-author Elizabeth Cochran, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey.

“Even if wastewater injection only directly affects a low-hazard fault, those smaller events could trigger an event on a larger fault nearby,” she told Live Science.

The Prague earthquake was the largest of thousands of quakes that rattled Oklahoma in late 2011. Three were magnitude-5 or stronger. The 2011 quakes struck along the Wilzetta fault, a fault zone near Prague. Earthquakes break faults like a boat plowing through thick ice — the fault zips open as the earthquake ruptures the fault, and then seals itself shut behind. Each of the three biggest quakes tore apart a different part of the Wilzetta fault, the researchers said. [Image Gallery: Deadly Earthquakes]

Triggered foreshock

The magnitude-5.7 earthquake near Prague was preceded by a 5.0 quake that hit a day earlier, on Nov. 5. This “foreshock” occurred near an active wastewater disposal well. Thewastewater injection triggered the Nov. 5 earthquake, researchers concluded in a study published in March 2013 in the journal Geology. However, the Nov. 6 earthquake was farther from the wells….”

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NSA Chief Proposes an End to Media Leaks

“WASHINGTON, D.C., March 7, 2014–National Security Agency (NSA) chief executive General Keith Alexander addressed a cyber-security panel Tuesday where he proclaimed that “media leaks legislation” he introduced to prevent journalists from reporting on government surveillance programs like those leaked by Edward Snowden could reach the floor within a couple weeks.

“We’ve got to handle media leaks first,” Alexander said in report by the Guardian. “I think we are going to make headway over the next few weeks on media leaks.”

Alexander stood in support of the United Kingdom’s actions last summer when the British government detained Guardian Journalist Glenn Greenwald’s partner David Miranda on terrorism charges for carrying leaked data obtained by Snowden. He stated similar measures should be implemented in the USA….”

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Documentary: How China Fooled the World

Cheers on your weekend!

[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUSjMnmS5lI 450 300]

imgpress

[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEssrGCG9DM 450 300]

 

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Ukraine as the U.S. Dollar Waterloo – Immediate Petro-Dollar Risk

“The desperation of the Anglo-American leadership, guided by the steady corrupt banker hands, has never been more acutely high, nor obvious in full view. The entire Ukraine situation is a travesty. It includes Langley agents killing police and street demonstrators from rooftops, the confirmation coming from the Estonian Embassy (translation of scripts). It includes thefts of official Ukrainian Govt funds, again sent to the Swiss hill sanctuary. It includes sanctions delivered by a US Paper Tiger, sure to cause horrific backlash. It involves the last gasp attempt to obstruct the Gazprom energy pipelines, which will inevitably corner the European market in monopoly. It involves subterfuge with the NATO card (aka Narcotics And Treachery Outlaws) with missiles placed on the Russian borders. Look for NATO members to find a back door to exit the spurious treaty. It involves playing with nitro-glycerine in the Petro-Dollar room. It involves putting tremendous risk for much more clear isolation of the United States. The more the USGovt pushes, the more the US will be isolated. Remember that Nazis steal from their enemy states, de-fraud from their allied states, and force themselves into an isolated state. In Ukraine, the United States has over-played its weak hand. Already, a secret document was leaked in London that the UKGovt would not support the US-led sanctions against Russia.

 

History repeats itself from the Kremlin phone calls made during the Syrian conflict just a few months ago, when the UKGovt withdrew its support and left the US isolated, looking very weak. Already, Putin has threatened to dump USTreasury Bonds. Putin aptly calls the Anglo-Americans as Mutants. Imagine the lunacy of trying to cut off the only Russian warm water military naval port in the Crimea. Just as stupid as the Trans Pacific Partnership faux pas, trying to cut off China from its Asian neighbors and partners in trade. The intelligence level of the USGovt has never been more stupid, destructive, and in full view. The lost ground for the United States is obvious and glaring in the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Caucasus region.

IMMEDIATE PETRO-DOLLAR RISK

If the Kremlin demands Gold bullion (or even Russian Rubles) for oil payments, then the interventions to subvert the Ruble currency by the London and Wall Street houses will backfire and blow up in the bankster faces. Expect any surplus Rubles would be converted quickly to Gold bullion. If the Chinese demand that they are permitted to pay for oil shipments in Yuan currency, then the entire Petro-Dollar platform will be subjected to sledge hammers and wrecking balls. The new Petro-Yuan defacto standard will have been launched from the Shanghai outpost. If the Saudis curry favor to the Russians and Chinese by accepting non-USDollar payments for oil shipments, then the Petro-Dollar is dead and buried. The rise of the Nat Gas Coop run by Gazprom is in progress, its gas pipelines to strangle the OPEC and its bastard Petro-Dollar child. The entire USDollar foundation with the USTreasury Bond bank reserve structure is at risk is collapsing, as consequence to the desperate adventure and criminal activity conducted in Ukraine.Just like with Syria, a hidden giant energy deposit is concealed under the table. Off the Lebanese and Syrian coast, a massive off-shore energy deposit was recently discovered. The US & UK & Israeli oligarchs wish to take it all. Confusion is their game. In the western plains of Ukraine, a massive gas deposit was recently discovered. The US & European oligarchs wish to take it all. Confusion is their game.

The danger level has never been higher. No resolution to the Global Monetary War can come, which we have been seeking, without a climax. It is hardly just a financial crisis amidst a stubborn economic recovery. The nature of the currencies and their underlying sovereign bond foundation is highly toxic, which requires a strong replacement as solution, using an alternative to the USDollar alongside its reserve ledger item the USTreasury Bond. A return to the Gold Standard is coming, but the birth will have loud pangs and possibly broad damage suffered. The Global Currency Reset is better named the Return to the Gold Standard. The United States and London will not give up their control of the Weimar Printing Press easily, used for elite self-dole of extreme wealth. It has served well as the Elite credit card. They will not go quietly, and assume their place in the backwater without taking the world to the brink. No climax can occur without enormous risk and loss. The Global Paradigm Shift is in full gear, with attendant risk huge here and now. My Jackass firm belief is that the US/UK fascist team face a Waterloo event in Ukraine, the victim to be the Imperial Dollar. This bulletin will not be a comprehensive note, as the situation is too vast. The information in the Hat Trick Letter is used to interweave a story of the impending removal of the USDollar from its corrupt throne.

UNITED STATES TRAPPED AND CORNERED

The Anglo Americans have fallen into a carefully designed trap by the Russians and Chinese in a clever designed sequence. More Sun Tzu tactics have been put into practice, which utilize the momentum from the enemy to be thrust back on them. Planning for final steps must have taken place during high level Putin meetings with Xi from the elite Sochi viewing box. The unfolding of events has been more carefully engineered and orchestrated than what appears. The US/UK team has been caught in a vise for months, as the rejection of the USDollar as global reserve currency is in high gear, the refusal of the USTBond a recognized trend in diversifications. The death process is slow and grueling. Much of the American Hemisphere is surrounded and controlled by Russia & China, whether the canal, the port facilities, the oil supply, the mineral deposits, even Yuan Swap facilities. Africa has largely gone under Chinese control, with Russia playing a hidden role as well.

The Persian Gulf is in transition, with the critical protectorate role shifting to China. The Qatar royals have just ordered a dismissal of USGovt ambassadors from their nation. Note that Qatar is the site of a giant USNaval base. To be sure, the Sochi Olympic Games are over, a successful event. The gloves have thus come off. The risks have reached acute levels. The US leadership seems cavalier to the risks that over half the USGovt debt is in foreign hands, over 30% of it in Russian & Chinese hands. A severe backlash cometh. The most vulnerable player in the room is the most aggressive, arrogant, vile, and obnoxious. The instability of the situation is far beyond acute. The victim will be the USDollar and its sidekick the USTreasury Bond. The USTBonds will be kicked out of the global banking system. The Third World awaits the United States, for its domestic betrayals, its financial failures, its criminal deeds, and its war aggression.

THE RUSSIAN BACKLASH TO BE SUDDEN

Russian President Vladimir Putin will slam the West, and very soon. The initial salvo might be a natural gas cutoff by Gazprom, the Russian giant which has fast moved into the global monopoly position. Eventually, Putin might demand gold payment for the natgas in the captured pipelines, that being the plan according to The Voice. Russia supplies one quarter of Western European gas needs. It will be the opening salvo for Gold Trade Settlement, for which the Iran workarounds to the sanctions provided the critical prototype. Combined with a formal announcement of USTreasury Bond sales in volume by Russia & China, the impact would be tremendous, even devastating. The reverberation will be soon seen as the pending demise of the defacto Petro-Dollar Standard, dictated by crude oil sales in USD terms. It will also be soon seen as the end of the USTBond as the global reserve standard in banking systems. Notice for over two years, the primary buyer of USGovt debt (and its refunded rollover) has been the US Federal Reserve via bond monetization, an absolute heresy to central banking. Hyper monetary inflation cannot stand as fixed policy. The world has responded by constructing an alternative to trade settlement. The forum has been the BRICS conferences and the G-20 Meetings of finance ministers. The US & UK will gradually be excluded from both forums, a process well along. Even traditional allies like Japan are buying gold in high volume, with suppressed lowball data so far. This is game over for the USDollar, the direct victim of Ukraine backlash. The war against Russia has been veiled, but the Jackass has exposed it.

VEILED ATTACKS AGAINST RUSSIAN GAZPROM

First was the attack against Russian Gazprom in Cyprus. It was a hidden attack made to look like a bank confiscation event. Notice no bank account confiscations outside the small but important island nation. The entire Russian banking clearance system had been done through Cyprus. Also, Russia was making significant transactions to purchase Gold bullion using Cyprus as clearing house for the purchases. Second was the attack against Russian Gazprom in Syria, another complicated event. The US had used the Libyan Embassy as a weapons running facility (major diplomatic violation), after which the US lost Egypt as a transfer station on the weapons running. The false flag attack in Syria was made to look like a chemical weapons event. However, the Saudis were the guilty party. The motive by the US was to block the advance of Russian Gazprom pipelines, which are to connect to the vast Iran supply centers. Iran has far more oil & gas than Iraq. In fact, Iran is the linchpin nation, which will throw its support toward Russia. Iran will push the Nat Gas Coop certain to eclipse Saudi Arabia and the loud gaggle of OPEC members. With the Russian Gazprom, together Iran and the Nat Gas Coop will usher in the Petro-Yuan Standard and bury the Petro-Dollar, the price set by Russia, the contracts set in Shanghai. Thus the Saudis will be expendable, and their Gold in London to be totally stolen.

Move to the present. Third was the attack against Russia Gazprom in Ukraine, done by the CIA and its partner security agents from the small ally nation on the SouthEast Med corner. The old game of destabilization, popular uprising, bank thefts, and now data files stolen has been put into action. The theft of significant funds in Ukraine has only started, funds gone to Swiss banks. The full betrayal will be seen soon. The US & UK have a lunatic plan to corral the Ukraine pipelines and possibly the vast farmlands of Ukraine. The wrong-footed plan will backfire, when Putin cuts off the natgas supply to Europe, when Putin demands a new type of energy supply payment structure, and when Putin engineers certain other steps. They might execute a Nat Gas Coop double in price, much like the OPEC event in 1973. Witness the upcoming Birth of the Eurasian Trade Zone, the birth pangs heard in Ukraine. The United States and Great Britain will not be included. The Eurasian Trade Zone will span 14 time zones and will settle in gold.

IRAN WORKAROUND AS KEY PROTOTYPE SOLUTION

The Anglo Americans have disrupted a key nation with longstanding historical and religious ties to Russia. The land of Ukraine also contains Russia’s only warm water naval port in the Crimea, the site of a recent suspicious earthquake. The response will be swift and firm. The Eastern nations (led by China & Russia) have been making detailed preparations in the last couple years to launch the alternative trade system founded in Gold Settlement. Its launch lacks a potential open door trigger, possibly offered by the Ukraine situation. The Gold Standard could return in a baptism by fire. The open door trigger appears to be the Western interventions into Ukraine, since the Western banking structures will not be permitted to collapse, the ugly reality. The abuse of the central bank monetary expansion and fraudulent bond redemption has gone totally out of control, forcing an endless cycle of alternative preparations and motivated reactions, including the Iran workaround with Turkey as intermediary in gold provision. Other attacks have taken place in the last few months against the Russian Ruble by Wall Street firms. The reaction will possibly be the launch of what could eventually be understood to be a gold-backed Ruble currency, combined with natgas cutoffs to Europe and USTBond dumps. At first it could be perceived as the oil-backed Ruble, but its quick hidden conversion to Gold bullion could be revealed later on. The USDollar will be discarded as obsolete, even toxic. The USDollar debt basis might be widely accepted to be the cause of the global financial crisis, and the USFed Quantitative Easing be widely understood to be the cause of the global financial collapse.

EUROPE AS KEY REGION TO TIP EASTWARD

Events inside Western Europe could unfold rapidly…….”

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Corporate Bond Default in China Sends Credit Markets Into a Tizzy

UPDATE: It’s happened – China has suffered its first domestic corporate bond default as Chaori fails to meet interest payments on schedule and rather more surprisingly failed to receive a last-minute mysterious or otherwise bailout…

  • *CITIC BANK WON’T HELP CHAORI MAKE INTEREST PAYMENT: 21ST HERALD
  • *SHANGHAI CHAORI DEFAULTS ON BOND INTEREST PAYMENTS, WSJ SAYS

But hey don’t sweat it, Moody’s think it’s great news…

  • *MOODY’S: DEFAULT BY CHAORI SOLAR WOULD ADVANCE CHINA’S BOND MKT

Maybe tell the issuers that couldn’t get their deals off today!!!

Of course what they mean is – maybe the market will finally start pricing in some real risk…

“Over the past few years, municipal governments and banks in China have stepped in to help distressed companies meet their bond payment obligations. These bailouts have led some investors to overlook the fundamental credit risks in bonds,” says Ivan Chung, a Moody’s Vice President and Senior Credit Officer.

 

 

“A default would likely make investors recalibrate their risk-return consideration for onshore bonds. Credit risk would play a more important role in pricing, thereby making the bond market more efficient in the allocation of capital,” adds Chung.

 

Chinese stocks are not happy

 

Wondering who’s next? We explained here…

 

and there are a lot to come…

 

As Bank of America reports in an analysis by David Cui, the Trust defaults are about to get hot and heavy….”

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Crimea Secession Supported by Russian Parliment

“MOSCOW—Russia’s upper house of parliament will support Crimea in its bid to join the Russian Federation, the speaker of the upper house of parliament said Friday.

“If the people of Crimea decide to join Russia in the referendum, we, as the upper house, will certainly support this decision,” Valentina Matvienko said at a meeting with Vladimir Konstantinov, his counterpart in the Crimean parliament.

A delegation from the Crimean peninsula were in Moscow to meet parliamentarians who warmly welcomed the guests and signaled their willingness to support the neighboring region.

Later Friday a group of military and civilian personnel from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe are making another attempt to enter the Crimean peninsula, after being stopped at two border checkpoints the day before, a spokesman for the organization said.

“The group is on their way from Kherson, where they spent the night, and is heading to a checkpoint in the area of a village called Chungar,” Shiv Sharma said, adding that the group of about 40 people is scheduled to arrive around 1330 local time (1130 GMT).

The group, from 22 of the OSCE member states, is traveling to Crimea to assess the situation on Ukraine’s Black Sea peninsula from a military perspective…..”

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Given Anti Russian Control of Parlament in the Ukraine Expectations Run High for War

“The current crisis is not about Crimea. It is about the rights of Russian-speakers throughout Ukraine whom the Kremlin wants to protect from violence and discrimination. Russia does not want a military intervention in Crimea and does not want to take Crimea from Ukraine.

There is a political solution to this crisis. First, create a coalition government in Kiev composed of all parties, including those from the east and south of the country. The current government is dominated by anti-Russian extremists from western Ukraine.

Second, Ukraine needs to draft a democratic constitution that has guarantees for Ukraine’s Russian-speaking population that would grant official status to the Russian language and establish the principle of federalism.

Third, presidential and parliamentary elections must be held soon. Independent election observers must play an active role in ensuring that the elections are free and fair. There is a real danger that they will be manipulated by the neo-Nazi militants who de facto seized power in a coup.

If these democratic and peaceful solutions to the crisis in Ukraine are rejected by the opposition forces that have seized power in Kiev, I am afraid that Russia will have no other choice but to revert to military means. If the junta leaders want to avoid war, they need to adopt Moscow’s peaceful and democratic proposals and adhere to them.

Those currently in power in Kiev are carrying out a political strategy that is not so much pro-European as it is anti-Russian, as evidenced by the surprisingly heavy-handed tactics the U.S. and European Union  have employed in Ukraine. In the end, a minority executed a violent coup that removed the democratically elected and legitimate president of Ukraine.

The Kremlin believes that the current Ukrainian leadership will manipulate the elections planned for May 25 to install a single leader or coalition government functioning much as former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili did in Tbilisi. A “Ukrainian Saakashvili” will unleash an even more repressive campaign of intimidation against Russian-speakers, one that over several years would stoke anti-Russia hysteria among the general population.

After that, Kiev may evict Russia’s Black Sea Fleet from Sevastopol and purge Crimea of any Russian influence. Ukraine could easily become a radicalized, anti-Russian state, at which point Kiev will fabricate a pretext to justify taking subversive action against Moscow. This looks especially likely considering that ruling coalition members from the neo-fascist Svoboda and Right Sector parties have already made territorial claims against Russia. They could easily send their army of activists to Russia to join local separatists and foment rebellion in the North Caucasus and other unstable regions in Russia. In addition, Russia’s opposition movement will surely want to use the successful experience and technology of the Euromaidan protests and, with the help and financial support of the West, try to carry out their own revolution in Moscow. The goal: to remove President Vladimir Putin from power and install a puppet leadership that will sell Russia’s strategic interests out to the West in the same way former President Boris Yeltsin did in the 1990s.

The official census puts the Russian minority in Ukraine at 16 percent of the total population, although that number was falsified. The actual number is closer to 25 percent. Surveys indicate that 45 percent of the country’s population speak Russian at home, 45 percent speak Ukrainian and 10 percent speak both languages. In the most recent Gallup survey….”

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U.S.S. Truxtun Guided Missile Destroyer En Route to the Black Sea

“Amid simmering tensions between the US and Russia over the crisis in Ukraine, US Navy officials say a US guided-missile destroyer which is en route to the Black Sea  has been sent there on a “routine” deployment.

According to the US Navy, the USS Truxtun departed the Greek port of Souda Bay on Thursday for joint training with Romanian and Bulgarian forces, AFP reported.

“While in the Black Sea, the ship will conduct a port visit and routine, previously planned exercises with allies and partners in the region,” the US Navy said in a statement.

Despite the US Navy’s assertion that the move is a “routine” deployment, it comes one day after the Pentagon announced plans for expanding aviation training in Poland and sending more F-15 fighter jets to police the skies over Baltic states.

Tensions between Washington and Moscow have intensified over the recent political crisis in Ukraine….”

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The U.S. Imposes Sanctions Upon Russia and Ukraine

“A former US Senate foreign policy analyst describes Washington’s decision to impose sanctions on a number of Russian and Ukrainian individuals as a “dangerous” move which can only “turn up the heat” with regard to the crisis in Ukraine.

“I think that there is a fundamental choice in front of the United States and Europe in dealing with the crisis in Ukraine. It really boils down to: Do we try to find a political solution that would reconcile the different parts of Ukraine with one another?” asked James Jatras in an interview with Press TV on Thursday.

US President Barack Obama signed an executive order on Thursday imposing a ban on visas and property of individuals whom the United States accuses of violating the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.

The US restrictions come after the local administration of Ukraine’s strategic Crimea region called for a referendum on March 16 in order to decide whether the autonomous region should join Russia or not…..”

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Phili Fed’s Plosser Frets Over QE Consequences

“Philadelphia Federal Reserve President Charles Plosser is “very worried” about the potential for unintended consequences of the Fed’s massive quantitative easing program.

Plosser told CNBC that the U.S. was still suffering from “lasting effects” of the recession and “may never return” to its previous growth rates – and warned that policy should not bet on growth returning to previous rates, saying it could be “many, many years”. …”

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Planned Layoffs Fall 7.3% According to Challenger Report

“…..U.S. employers planned to cut payrolls by 41,835 in February, down 7.3 percent from January’s 45,107 planned layoffs, according to a report by Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The February cuts compared with 55,356 planned cuts in the year-earlier month, down 24 percent…..”

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Crimea Parliment Votes to Join Mother Russia

“While the world is convinced that Putin’s Tuesday press conference was an admission of blinking to the west, the reality is anything but that, and hours ago Crimea’s parliament voted to join Russia on Thursday and its Moscow-backed government set a referendum within 10 days on the decision in what Reuters said is a “a dramatic escalation of the crisis over the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula.” To be sure, the Crimea – which has an ethnic Russian majority – affiliation to Moscow as opposed to Kiev is well-known, yet still the sudden acceleration of moves to bring Crimea formally under Moscow’s rule came as European Union leaders gathered for an emergency summit to seek ways to pressure Russia to back down and accept mediation. And now all Putin has to do is sit back and say the people have spoken and without spilling a drop of blood has effectively split the country in two parts, with the entire east of Ukraine, where pro-Russian sentiment also runs high – sure to follow Crimea. Just as we said from the very beginning.

From Reuters:

The Crimean parliament voted unanimously “to enter into the Russian Federation with the rights of a subject of the Russian Federation”. The vice premier of Crimea, home to Russia’s Black Sea military base in Sevastopol, said a referendum on the status would take place on March 16. The announcement, which diplomats said could not have been made without Russian President Vladimir Putin’s approval, raised the stakes in the most serious east-west confrontation since the end of the Cold War.

 

Far from seeking a diplomatic way out, Putin appears to have chosen to create facts on the ground before the West can agree on more than token action against him.

 

EU leaders had been set to warn but not sanction Russia over its military intervention after Moscow rebuffed Western diplomatic efforts to persuade it to pull forces in Crimea, with a population of about 2 million, back to their bases. It was not immediately clear what impact the Crimean moves would have.

 

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said in a Twitter message: “We stand by a united and inclusive #Ukraine.”

 

French President Francois Hollande told reporters on arrival at the summit: “There will be the strongest possible pressure on Russia to begin lowering the tension and in the pressure there is, of course, eventual recourse to sanctions.”

To be sure, the new Kiev government – which may or may not have killed its own citizens in order to rise to power while blaming the atrocities on Yanukovich as described yesterday – has responded in kind to how Putin views them, and declared the referendum illegal and opened a criminal investigation against Crimean Prime Minister Sergei Askyonov, who was appointed by the region’s parliament last week. The Ukrainian government does not recognise his authority or that of the parliament. Still, it is by now far too late for Kiev to enforce its will in Crimea.

In the meantime…”

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The ECB Keeps Rates Unchanged

“Even though 14 out of the surveyed 54 economists expected a rate cut of some sort, and some were even calling for an outright QE any minute now, this time the majority of academics, or 40 of them, were right and the ECB proceeded with no changes to its various interest rates.

From the ECB:

At today’s meeting the Governing Council of the ECB decided that the interest rate on the main refinancing operations and the interest rates on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will remain unchanged at 0.25%, 0.75% and 0.00% respectively.

 

The President of the ECB will comment on the considerations underlying these decisions at a press conference starting at 2.30 p.m. CET today….”

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Now for Something Completely Different: You Can Not Avoid The Coming Paradigm Shift

“This may seem like a far out idea, but is it possible that our thoughts create fields of information that go into the Global Mind we share? Is it possible our thoughts might create ‘thought fields’ that can interact with the thought fields of others? There is a fascinating phenomenon in science known as the ‘multiples effect’. The multiples effect if when multiple people geographically isolated from one another come up with the exact same discovery at the exact same time. By 1922, there had been 148 major scientific breakthroughs identified to have been discovered in such a way. Here are just a FEW examples:

– Evolution (Darwin and Wallace)
– Calculus (Newton and Leibniz)
– Decimal fractions – 3 people
– Sunspots – 4 people in 1611
– Law of conservation of energy – 4 people in 1847
– Steamboat – 4 people
– Telescope – 9 people
– Thermometer – 6 people

Is it really possible that all 148 major discoveries happened at the exact same time coincidentally by people who were not sharing their ideas with each other? Imagine two people completely geographically isolated from each other working on the same problem at the same time. They are each intently working on the same exact dilemma, with their thoughts floating around in the consciousness field energetically interacting with each other. It’s kind of like the experience we all have with our friends where we know what they are going to say right before they say it.

CONSCIOUSNESS IS NON-LOCAL.

Below is a picture of pyramids build in three separate ancient cultures geographically isolated from one another. There is no possible way these cultures would be able to communicate with one another, yet the pyramids they build are exactly alike. Is this sheer coincidence?

Scientific Proof That Our Minds Are All Connected | In5D.com………”

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[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmN2RL4VJsE#t=683 450 300]

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Restoring Democracy on a Global Scale

” “Slavery is the legal fiction that a person is property. Corporate personhood is the legal fiction that property is a person.” –– Anonymous

In 2010 the NeoConservative, pro-corporate, anti-democratic Roberts’ 5/4 Supreme Court’s decided in the  Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission ruling to grant personhood to corporations by allowing unlimited, anonymous monetary contributions to political campaigns and candidates. This ruling, called by many to be the worst Supreme Court decision of the past century, has emboldened the already powerful and corruptible multinational corporations (that now have achieved dominion over US politics as well as the economy) to “buy” any number of politicians and brain-wash voters by multi-million dollar ad campaigns that the rest of us can’t afford to counter in state and national elections.

The US Supreme Court has thus made legal the absurd notion that inanimate corporations like PolyMet and GTac (potential despoilers of northern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin’s irreplaceable wetlands, aquifers and aboriginal land and water rights) deserve the same privileges (but not the same responsibilities) as living humans.

After the ruling came down, there was only a brief bit of outrage from the so-called national leadership of our essentially “one-party system” (one-party, that is, when it comes to the GOP and Democratic Party’s corporate and militarist agendas). What outrage was expressed was quickly drowned out by a well-timed, mainstream media-orchestrated “tempest in a teapot”, namely Toyota’s recall of tens of thousands of accelerator pedals (that had only infrequently been the cause of significant accidents).

What Should be the Punishment for Corporate Entities That Plunder and Pillage?

The following question about the consequences of the Supreme Court’s democracy-threatening decision must be asked:

If corporations are given the privileges of personhood, shouldn’t they also bear the same responsibilities and incur the same punishments as individuals when they commit crimes, poison the water and air or rape the land?

Peace and justice activists applauded when the citizens of Shapleigh, Maine protected their water rights last year from the insatiable water-extracting corporate giant Nestle. (See video and more information on this episode at: (http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/40335).

Nestle, one of the many multinational corporate exploiters, has no allegiance to Maine, Minnesota or Wisconsin or any other state where this foreign entity tries to extract water or minerals that never were theirs to begin with. But when the minerals have been depleted and the water has been polluted or drained, Nestle, PolyMet and GTac will be gone, and so will Exxon/Mobil, British Petroleum, Halliburton, Deep Water Horizon, British Petroleum, Coca-Cola, Perrier or whatever other corporate intruder that ruthlessly extracts or poisons the people’s resources — all for the economic benefit of their faceless investors, shareholders and CEOs at their out-of-state corporate headquarters, none of whom will have to live with the poisoned environment that they have left behind.

The good citizens of Shapleigh recognized the foxes that tried to get inside their henhouse, and they did the right thing by vigorously resisting; and another underdog David — with a lot of justice, a lot of pluck and a little luck on his side — won a rare victory against another evil giant.

 Move to Amend: Overturning Citizens United

That small victory against injustice should illustrate what must be done if American democracy is ever to thrive again. The outrageous Citizens United decision must be overturned with a constitutional amendment. (See www.movetoamend.org for more.) The future of the nation, our children, the planet, our drinking water, natural habitat and aboriginal rights are all at stake. And exploitative corporations, just like other sociopathic entities, don’t seem to care.

It is important to understand that the allegiance of big corporations is to its investors, shareholders, executives and management teams, and not to the people whose lives and health depend on the sustainability of the land, water, air and food supplies.

Most corporate shareholders and executives from multinational corporations that are part of Big Pharma, Big Food, Big Agribusiness, Big Oil, Big Finance, etc are motivated by profits and not the common good, and therefore they are not concerned when local resources are used up and the struggling, degraded communities are left behind to fend for themselves (after being fooled into trusting non-human corporations that are inherently untrustworthy [see below]).

”Trust us: We’re the Experts; Toxic Sludge is Good for You; We’ll Clean up After Ourselves” — and Other Corporate Lies

Conscienceless mega-corporations that swoop down on unsuspecting people and naïve governmental bodies, usually ask them to “trust us” and that — at some time in the uncertain future – they will un-poison the often permanently-toxified environment that they secretly intend to just leave behind. The people, understandably desperate for jobs, are usually fooled into believing well-crafted disinformation that is cunningly delivered — until it is too late and the mess that is left behind is no longer the sneaky corporation’s problem. It’s an old con.

Promises made during the courtship phase are likely to be broken with impunity when these foreign corporations are forced to pull-out, merge with other entities or file for bankruptcy. Silver-tongued experts from out of state are very good at getting us rubes up north all starry-eyed over temporary jobs, jobs, jobs while discounting the huge risks of permanent dead and dying zones being created because of their poisonous chemicals.

Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola and Union Carbide/Dow Chemical and Henry Kissinger

A good example of the many tax-avoiding American mega-corporations is Wal-Mart. A large portion of its profits go to a handful of Walton family billionaires in Arkansas. Wal-Mart successfully — and legally — avoids paying for healthcare insurance and other benefits for most of their exploited, underpaid, part-time employees, who are also victims of the corporation’s notorious union-busting policies.

US taxpayers are left holding the bag while Wal-Mart legally avoids what should ethically be their corporate responsibility: to be fair to their employees. Wal-Mart’s notorious below-subsistence level wages forces many of their workers to work a second or third job and also seek welfare benefits — a cunning cost-shifting tactic that places economic burdens on the tax-paying public.

Another example is Coca-Cola. Coke depends on water that it extracts from any water source or aquifer from which the corporation can economically extract it, including, as a particularly egregious example, the aquifers that are situated beneath thirsty, struggling, starving (and then suicidal) farmers who are losing their farms in newly drought-stricken India.

Millions of gallons of water, that have traditionally been used for farmland irrigation systems, are being depleted by Coca-Cola in order to meet the artificial demand that has been created for the sweet, sugary, caffeinated (and therefore addictive), nutritionally useless, obesity-inducing and diabetes-producing soft drink that contains a few cents worth of ingredients and then is sold to poor people everywhere for as much as the market will bear.

Coke’s predation of poor people in India and elsewhere brings to mind another corporate crime that has never been brought to justice. The infamous 1984 Union Carbide cyanide catastrophe in Bhopal, India that killed 25,000 slum-dwellers, left 100,000 permanently poisoned victims whose lives were ruined, and has left uncounted numbers of people living on poisoned soil, drinking poisoned water and breathing poisoned air.

Every person that has been exposed to……”

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Why Has the Main Stream Media Ignored Anti Semitism in the Ukraine ?…and No Hillary, Russia is Not Like Hitler’s Germany

Spindoctors will not stop spewing garbagio: Hillary Clinton Compares Russia to Hitler

“In World War II, the United States fought against rabidly anti-Semitic fascists.  In 2014, the United States helps them overthrow democratically-elected governments.  And the sick thing is that the mainstream media is acting an an accomplice because it is purposely ignoring or greatly playing down the rabid anti-Semitism in Ukraine.  The anti-Semitism of many of the “reformers” that have seized power in Kiev does not fit with the narrative that the U.S. government is trying to push, so the mainstream media conveniently turns a blind eye to the fact that the United States is essentially helping neo-Nazis take power.  In fact, leaders of the Svoboda Party have been appointed to numerous important positions throughout the new government.  As you will read about below, the head of the Svoboda Party has denounced the “criminal activities” of “organized Jewry”, another top Svoboda official regularly quotes Joseph Goebbels, and the Party itself was known as “the Social-National Party” (in reference to National Socialists) until 2004.  There is a long history of anti-Semitism in Ukraine, but our politicians in Washington D.C. don’t seem to care about that.  All they seem to care about is making sure that there is not a pro-Russian government in Ukraine no matter what the cost.

There is a reason why Russian President Vladimir Putin cited “ultranationalists” as one of the reasons why Russian troops had to intervene in Ukraine.  What we are seeing in Ukraine right now is eerily reminiscent of what we saw in Nazi Germany before World War II.  The following comes from a recent Gawker article

Earlier this week, a synagogue in the country’s southeast was firebombed. There have been multiple reported beatings of Jews and acts of vandalism at Kiev synagogues. A leading rabbi in Kiev has called for Jews to leave the city and the country, if possible—though he later said he was stressing that it’s dangerous for everyone out there—and the Israeli embassy has reportedly advised members of the Jewish community to stay off the streets.

Some people are dismissing these as “isolated incidents”.  Well, then how do you explain the white power flags and other neo-Nazi symbols that have been going up all around Kiev?  In the video posted below, you can see a white power flag that has been erected in a city government building in Kiev…”

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