These Guys Could F%$# Up a 2 Car Funeral

And Donald Trump's summit with Kim Jong-un has been canceled:

President Trump on Thursday pulled out of a highly anticipated summit meeting with Kim Jong-un, accusing the North Koreans of bad faith and lamenting that “this missed opportunity is a truly sad moment in history.”

The president made his announcement in a remarkably personal, at times mournful-sounding letter to Mr. Kim, North Korea’s leader, in which he cited the North’s “tremendous anger and open hostility” in recent public statements as the specific reason for canceling the meeting.

Mr. Trump said later that the meeting, which had been scheduled for June 12 in Singapore, could still happen, and North Korea issued a strikingly conciliatory response, saying it hoped Mr. Trump would reconsider.

But Mr. Trump also renewed talk of military action against the North and vowed to keep pressing economic sanctions, guaranteeing that for now, at least, his unlikely courtship of Mr. Kim will give way to a more familiar cycle of threats and tension.

So, now we are back to nuclear chicken.  This is a YUGE screw up.

You Remember the Story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf?

After about a year and a half of a noun, a verb, and Vladimir Putin, we now have some pretty good evidence that Donald Trump and his relatives have been selling foreign policy.

We're talking an explicit quid pro quo, but you'll hear very little about this because it all fades into the miasma that is Trump's ethical lapses.

In the process of pursuing Vladimir Putin as if he were Ernst Stavro Blofeld, people have ignored the fact that Trump is deeply and profoundly corrupt, and always has been:

Today marks the 16-month anniversary of Donald Trump becoming the 45th president of the United States, and nowhere has our unlikeliest commander-in-chief placed a greater stamp on America’s place in the world than his dramatic — and sometimes arbitrary and capricious, or so it seems — shifts in foreign policy. None of these seismic changes seemed more baffling than last spring’s abrupt sellout of the Persian Gulf state of Qatar — a longtime ally where the U.S. Air Force Central Command and its 10,000 American troops are now based.

………

Trump stunned his own foreign policy team — including then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Defense Secretary James Mattis — when he tweeted that Qatar is a sponsor of terrorism and seemingly endorsed an economic and political blockage of the tiny, oil-rich nation organized and led by two powerful neighbors, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, or UAE.

………

How to make sense of a 180-degree shift in policy that seemed so counter to U.S. interests in the region? A few months later, people who suspect the worst about Trump and his minions learned a possible motive that was almost too cynical to comprehend. Not long before Team Trump switched gears on Qatar, key officials from the emirate had met with Charles Kushner — father of Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared, who’s in charge of Trump’s Middle East portfolio — to discuss a massive Qatar-funded bailout of 666 Fifth Ave., the debt-laden Manhattan skyscraper that was threatening to sink the Kushner family real estate empire. But the Qataris rejected the deal — just weeks before the policy about-face. Whatever actually happened, the appearance was simply awful. 

No, the reality is simply awful.

It also seems not to have been the full story. This weekend, the New York Times published a stunning report about a plan floated by a longtime emissary for the Saudis and the UAE in early August 2016, when Trump had just grabbed the GOP nomination but faced an uphill campaign against Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump Jr., aide Stephen Miller and Erik Prince, founder of the notorious mercenary outfit once know as Blackwater, listened intently as the emissary offered Team Trump millions of dollars in assistance, including a covert social-media campaign, to help Trump win that would be run by a former Israeli spy who specializes in psychological warfare, or psywar.

“The emissary, George Nader, told Donald Trump Jr. that the princes who led Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were eager to help his father win election as president,” the Times reported. Some key elements — exactly who was behind the plan, and what parts, if any, were carried out — remain murky.

I should mention here that Nader is a convicted felon, having served multiple sentences for child porn and sexual child abuse.  (As Anna Russel would say, "I'm not making this up, you know.")

And the corruption is pretty explicit:

As long as Trump and Jared Kushner continue to hold onto their business holdings while leading U.S. foreign policy, this cloud will remain. Did Trump voice support last week for ending American sanctions on the Chinese telecom company ZTE Corp. because it would benefit their U.S. subcontractors, or because a Chinese fund is investing $500 million in an Indonesia theme park that should dramatically boost the value of a related Trump Organization development? Then there’s the matter of Qatar, because in recent months it has become clear that the Gulf state is again in the Trump administration’s good graces, and the strategic alliance has been renewed as if last spring’s blowup never happened. Is that because it’s a more sensible policy — or is it because a firm called Brookfield Asset Management that is backed heavily by Qatari funds is near a deal to bail out Kushner’s 666 Fifth Ave? Is it any wonder that so many longtime key allies of the United States wonder if they can trust Trump’s America?

I note that Trump was thoroughly corrupt, and deeply mobbed up last year, but, instead of looking at the stuff that blatantly obvious, we have discussions of pee tapes.

So, Is Your Money on "Suicide" or "Natural Causes"?

Ecuador has just pulled Julian Assange's security arrangements.

When juxtaposed with their preventing his communication with the outside world, I'm beginning to see the actuarial possibilities as kind of bleak:

The president of Ecuador, Lenin Moreno, has ordered the withdrawal of additional security assigned to the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has remained for almost six years.

………

Over more than five years, Ecuador put at least $5m (£3.7m) into a secret intelligence budget that protected him while he had visits from Nigel Farage, members of European nationalist groups and individuals linked to the Kremlin.

Rafael Correa, the then Ecuadorian president who approved of the operation, later defended the security measures as “routine and modest”.

However, his successor, Moreno, appears to differ in his view. His government said in a statement: “The president of the republic, Lenin Moreno, has ordered that any additional security at the Ecuadorian embassy in London be withdrawn immediately.

………

Moreno has previously described Assange’s situation as “a stone in his shoe”.

I inclined to believe that, "A stone in his shoe," translated from the Ecuadorean dialect of Spanish to, "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?"

This will not end well.

Going Long on Fallout Shelters

As expected, the human Trump has abrogated the Iran nuclear deal.

Our allies are wring their hands, Iran is irate, and the rest of the world is waiting for Iran to restart its nuclear program.

About the only bright side to this is the very real possibility that a spike in gasoline prices just before the mid-term elections might save Democrats from their own cowardice and incompetence..

Not Stupid, Evil

Normally, when someone makes a gaffe like this, I assume stupidity, not malice, but this is John Bolton, and in Bolton's case, never attribute something to incompetence that can be attributed to malice:

John Bolton, President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, said on Sunday that the United States is using the “Libya model” as it seeks to denuclearize the Korean peninsula—a process that eventually led to the destabilization of that country and the death of its dictator, and one that has drawn North Korea’s ire in the past.

“We have very much in mind the Libya model from 2003, 2004,” Bolton said on Fox News Sunday, referring to the African country’s decision to get rid of its nuclear weapons after negotiating with American officials. Seven years later, Libya found itself in a civil war that led to the death of its dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, after an intervention by the U.S. and its allies.

It’s unclear how Bolton’s message will be received by Kim Jong Un’s regime, which has already taken some steps—though none of them concrete or verifiable—toward denuclearization. Pyongyang has long cited U.S. interventions in countries such as Libya as a reason why it needs nuclear weapons.

As the civil war was intensifying there in 2011, North Korea said it was a mistake for Libya to agree to dismantle its nuclear program. A North Korea Foreign Ministry official described it at the time as “an invasion tactic to disarm the country.”

Boulton brought up the "L-word" because he wants to sabotage negotiations, period, full stop.

England Doesn't Need the City of London Either

The EU's chief negotiator has stated that the EU does not need the City of London, and has no plans to create a special relationship with the UK financial sector. (FYI, the City of London is a 1 square mile area which is the heart of the British financial industry, the City of Londonis to London as Wal Street is to New York City)
No one needs the City of London except for a a small number of overpaid prats in Savile Row suits.

Finance is has become increasingly parasitic as it has grown to subsume larger portions of the UK (and US) economy, and the City of London is even worse than Wall Street, because while they both spend much of their effort on speculative activities of little or no benefit, the City of London's special products are money laundering and tax evasion, which benefits no one:

The EU does not need the City of London, and Theresa May’s “pleading” for a special deal for the UK’s financial services sector will not be rewarded, the EU’s chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, has said.

In his toughest rebuff yet to the demands made by the British prime ministerin her landmark Mansion House speech, Barnier suggested the City would be granted nothing more generous than that enjoyed by Wall Street.

“Some argue that the EU desperately needs the City of London, and that access to financing for EU27 business would be hampered – and economic growth undermined – without giving UK operators the same market access as today,” Barnier said at a meeting of finance ministers in Sofia, Bulgaria. “This is not what we hear from market participants, and it is not the analysis that we have made ourselves.”

I am not surprised at Barnier's comments.

The EU has plenty of expertise in tax evasion, it constitutes almost the entire economy of Luxembourg, and money laundering ain't rocket science.

The Brexit could be an opportunity for the British to turn their economy toward more productive and more honest endeavors, with the added benefit of reducing inequality, but the Tories hate that idea, and they are in charge, for a while, at least.

Not Learning the Lessons of Cuba

What a surprise, our policy of sanctions against Russia does not hurt Putin's political standing among Russian citizens.

If anything, it improves his political positions, because hardships can be blamed on an aggressively overbearing United States.

Seriously, this sh%$ kept the Castros in power for 60 years (and counting) in Russia, why should we expect anything different this time?

Yea, This Russiapohobia Sh%$ Is Getting out of Hand………

It appears that the latest Russian spies prevented from entering the United States include a prima ballerina with the Bolshoi Ballet:

Amid roiling relations between the US and Russia, two members of Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet — including one of its prima ballerinas — have been refused visas to perform in New York City, Page Six has exclusively learned.

Organizers of a Lincoln Center gala where Olga Smirnova and Jacopo Tissi were due to dance on Monday believe the Department of Homeland Security’s decision may be motivated by the myriad tensions between the superpowers — and say that Smirnova is so revered in Moscow that her treatment could create a Russian backlash.

On Wednesday the department’s site read, “On April 10, 2018, we denied your… petition for a nonimmigrant worker.”

“I don’t understand it,” Linda K. Morse, chair of Youth America Grand Prix — which is hosting the gala — told Page Six. “One interpretation is that it’s political. That’s my knee-jerk reaction, but I can’t figure out why — other than that they’re Russian. But it doesn’t make any sense.”

The immigration service’s objection appears to be that the organizers applied for a visa usually granted to groups of entertainers, but since Smirnova and Tissi were planning to perform at the “Stars of Today Meets the Stars of Tomorrow” gala as individuals, rather than alongside the rest of the Bolshoi company, they’re not eligible for it.

But we’re told that YAGP has got the same visa for dancers — including Smirnova — in the past. Morse told us she “definitely” thinks the move could create political resentment in Russia. “Olga is considered the number one ballerina in the world right now,” said Morse, “and to refuse her visa is striking. It’s alarming.”

It's also very, very, very stupid.

This

Seven years ago, Columbia professor Jeffrey Sachs criticized Obama for calling for regime change in Syria.

He makes the point that most of the bad things that have happened as a result of actions by the US and the Persian Gulf, and it has destabilized the region, and the refugee crisis has destabilized Europe.

Regime change has been a disaster, and it has been a predictable, and predicted one:

How Convenient!

Viktoria Srkipal, Sergei Skripal's niece, has been denied a visa to visit her uncle and cousin in the UK.

This is unbelievably paranoid and stupid on the part of the UK government. It makes them look like they have something to hide:

The niece of poisoned former Russian spy Sergei Skripal has been denied a visa to come to Britain, the UK Home Office (interior ministry) said on Friday.

Viktoria Skripal had planned to travel to Britain to take Sergei’s daughter Yulia back to Russia.

This is literally the worst possible way that British authorities could have handled this.

Right now the British state security apparatus is more Mr. Bean than it is James Bond.

And Macedonia Achieves Moral Superiority over the United States

It is admittedly a VERY low bar, but the Balkan nation has apologized for its role in aiding the torture of Khaled El-Masri over a decade ago.

From the US, who tortured him unmercifully for months, crickets:

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) has formally apologized to a man it unlawfully seized, held incommunicado, and handed over to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency 14 years ago, during the secret CIA rendition and torture program which followed the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

Macedonian security personnel detained Khaled El-Masri, a German citizen, at Macedonia’s border on December 31, 2003, and interrogated him in secret for over three weeks. They then delivered him to CIA agents who flew him to Afghanistan, where he was imprisoned for almost four months in inhuman conditions, and then further mistreated him in a notorious CIA facility. In late May, the CIA reverse rendered El-Masri to Europe, and then left him on a roadside in Albania, long after American authorities had concluded that they had mistakenly captured the wrong man.

On December 13, 2012, in a case brought on El-Masri’s behalf by the Open Society Justice Initiative, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights found the FYROM in breach of several provisions of the European Convention of Human Rights and awarded compensation of €60,000, which the government subsequently paid.

Now, six years later, in a letter to El-Masri dated March 28, 2018, Macedonia’s minister of foreign affairs, Nikola Dimitrov, has expressed his “sincere apologies and unreserved regrets” for what he described as the “improper conduct of our authorities” in 2004. He also noted the “immeasurable and painful experiences and grave physical and psychological wounds you suffered” as a result.

And the only response of the US, in response to a spectacular bit of incompetence has been to invoke the state secrets privilege in order to prevent his day in court.

Welcome to American exceptionalism.

That sound you hear is Alexis de Tocqueville spinning in his grave at about 10,000 RPM.

Aluminum Tubes Anyone?

Theresa May stated that the UK chemical weapons establishment at Porton Downs had definitively identified that the "Novichok" poison used against xxxxx was of Russian origin.

Not so much:

British scientists at the Porton Down defence research laboratory have not established that the nerve agent used to poison Sergei and Yulia Skripal was made in Russia, it has emerged.

Gary Aitkenhead, the chief executive of the government’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL), said the poison had been identified as a military-grade novichok nerve agent, which could probably be deployed only by a nation state.

Aitkenhead said the government had reached its conclusion that Russia was responsible for the Salisbury attack by combining the laboratory’s scientific findings with information from other sources.

The UK government moved quickly to make it clear that the prime minister, Theresa May, had always been clear the assessment from Porton Down was “only one part of the intelligence picture”. The comments came hours before an extraordinary meeting in The Hague of the executive council of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), called by Russia.

Speaking to Sky News, Aitkenhead said it was not possible for scientists alone to say precisely where the novichok had been created.

He said: “It’s a military-grade nerve agent, which requires extremely sophisticated methods in order to create – something that’s probably only within the capabilities of a state actor.”

He denied Russian claims that the substance could have come from Porton Down, which is eight miles from Salisbury, saying: “There’s no way that anything like that would ever have come from us or leave the four walls of our facilities.”

Aitkenhead said: “We were able to identify it as novichok, to identify it was a military-grade nerve agent. We have not verified the precise source, but we have provided the scientific information to the government, who have then used a number of other sources to piece together the conclusions that they have come to.”

So, a downgrade from a certainty to a likelihood.

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that this was done just before Russia hosts the World Cup, and the fact that neither of the two alleged targets are dead from something that is supposed to be many times more toxic than VX.

I do not know what is going on, but it appears that whatever it is is weird.

Note that weird does not rule out the Russians, but it means that the path to this attack had to take a very strange route.

John Bolton Is Actually Worse Than I Had Previously Known

It turns out that in a dispute over WMD inspections before the Iraq war, he threatened the children of a UN official:

Who better to advise the bully-in-chief, Donald Trump, on when to make war and kill people than another bully? It’s difficult, after all, to avoid the label — that of a bully — when thinking of John Bolton, the former Bush administration official-turned-Fox News pundit who Trump recently picked as his national security adviser.

“John Bolton is a bully,” José Bustani, the retired Brazilian diplomat and former head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, told me when I reached him by phone in Paris earlier this month.

………

In 2001, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell had penned a letter to Bustani, thanking him for his “very impressive” work. By March 2002, however, Bolton — then serving as under secretary of state for Arms Control and International Security Affairs — arrived in person at the OPCW headquarters in the Hague to issue a warning to the organization’s chief. And, according to Bustani, Bolton didn’t mince words. “Cheney wants you out,” Bustani recalled Bolton saying, referring to the then-vice president of the United States. “We can’t accept your management style.”

Bolton continued, according to Bustani’s recollections: “You have 24 hours to leave the organization, and if you don’t comply with this decision by Washington, we have ways to retaliate against you.”

There was a pause.

“We know where your kids live. You have two sons in New York.”

(emphasis mine)

Great shades of Elvis.

Their evil and stupidity outstrips my fertile imagination.

Would You Like to Play Global Thermonuclear War?

The Trump administration has announced that John Bolton will be the next chairman of the National Security Council, replacing H.R. McMaster.

Even among the Neocons, John Bolton is known as a foaming at the mouth war monger, and I would expect him to aggressively lobby for military strikes against the DPRK and Iran.

This will not end well:

President Trump named John R. Bolton, a hard-line former American ambassador to the United Nations, as his third national security adviser on Thursday, continuing a shake-up that creates one of the most hawkish national security teams of any White House in recent history.

Mr. Bolton will replace Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, the battle-tested Army officer who was tapped last year to stabilize a turbulent foreign policy operation but who never developed a comfortable relationship with the president.

The move, which was sudden but not unexpected, signals a more confrontational approach in American foreign policy at a time when Mr. Trump faces mounting challenges, including from Iran and North Korea.

………

Mr. Bolton, an outspoken advocate of military action who served in the George W. Bush administration, has called for action against Iran and North Korea. In an interview on Thursday on Fox News, soon after his appointment was announced in a presidential tweet, he declined to say whether Mr. Trump should go through with a planned meeting with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un.

We are all gonna die.

International Pun of the Day

Russian to Judgement

—Craig Murray

He's discussing the recent poisonings of a Russian double agent in Russia.

He's skeptical of the current narrative, as we all should be in this world of "81mm Aluminum Tubes."

I'd take his arguments at the link with a grain of salt, but I love the pun.

The Intellectual Bankruptcy of the US Foreign Policy Consensus

Rather unsurprisingly, it appears in Foreign Policy magazine, in all caps, "THE MEETING IS THE CONCESSION".

For more than 2 decades the US policy has been that there should be no talks without full capitulation by the DPRK.

This is not a sane or consistent way to conduct foreign policy.

Another Stopped Clock Moment

Over at the 2^nd worst OP/ED page in the nation, they are wringing their hands at the demise of the most transparent CIA front in history, the National Endowment for Democracy:

Speaking to the British Parliament in 1982, President Ronald Reagan called on the United States “to foster the infrastructure of democracy” to help ensure that people around the world were empowered to determine their own fates. Now, at this increasingly fraught moment for freedom around the world, the Trump administration wants to dismantle that infrastructure.

Buried in the State Department’s fiscal 2019 budget request is a proposal not only to slash the budget of the National Endowment for Democracy but also to disassemble its relationships with its core institutes, including the National Democratic Institute and the International Republican Institute. For the NED and those institutes, the proposal is an assault not only on their organizations but also on the pro-democracy mission they are dedicated to.

“If implemented, the proposal would gut the program, force crippling layoffs and the symbolic meaning would also be shattering, sending a signal far and wide that the United States is turning its back on supporting brave people who share our values,” said NED President Carl Gershman.

The Trump administration proposal would allow the NED to continue issuing small grants but move funding of its core institutes to the State Department, where the IRI and NDI would have to compete with private contractors. The organizations involved argue that keeping funding decisions at arm’s length from the State Department allows the NED network to do things on the edges of the pro-democracy movement that the U.S. government can’t or won’t, such as supporting Chinese dissidents in ways that upset Beijing.

The NED has been little more than a a front for regime change efforts for our state security apparatus since its founding.

It is a cover for, "A boot stamping on a human face - forever," fomenting civil wars and civil unrest against regimes deemed insufficiently pliant.

This is why, for example, the NED has been largely silent regarding the excesses of the House of Saud.

Good riddance, even if its demise is for the wrong reason.  (We know that it's the wrong reason because it's Trump and his Evil Minions^™ doing this.)

About that Putin Speech

The Russians believe that US hostilities with them never ended, as Putin's recent speech eloquently illustrates:

Russia has developed a new array of nuclear weapons that are invincible, according to President Vladimir Putin.

Mr Putin made the claims as he laid out his key policies for a fourth presidential term, ahead of an election he is expected to win in 17 days' time.

The weapons he boasted of included a cruise missile that he said could "reach anywhere in the world".

He said of the West: "They need to take account of a new reality and understand ... [this]... is not a bluff."

Giving his annual state of the nation speech, Mr Putin used video presentations to showcase the development of two new nuclear delivery systems that he said could evade detection. One video graphic appeared to show missiles raining down on the US state of Florida.

This speech appears directed more toward the Russian electorate, the next Presidential election is about 2 weeks away, but it is a rather unwelcome development.

Most of the weapons shown are unlikely to reach full deployment.  I find the nuclear powered torpedo and drones to be rather fanciful.

On the other hand, I do believe that the R-28 Sarmat (NATO designation SS-X-30 Satan 2) will enter service, as well as the various hypersonic glide reentry vehicles, which should add significant complications to US missile defense systems.

It should be noted that the timing of these announcements does seem to be correspond to development being started when George W. Bush withdrew from the ABM treaty in 2002.

It's All about the Defense Contractors, Isn't It?

Iraq is looking at purchasing the S-400 surface to air missile system from Russia, and the US is threatening sanctions:

Having suffered two decades of US-led bombing campaigns, terrorist insurgency and sectarian violence, Iraq is now trying to protect its airspace. But the US threatens to slap it with sanctions if it buys Russian missile systems.

Baghdad has recently expressed interest in purchasing Russia’s advanced S-400 surface-to-air missile defense systems. However, if Iraq goes forward with the plan, it faces a dilemma: the US could potentially retaliate with sanctions under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act of 2017 (CAATSA).

"We want to purchase any weapons that will strengthen the security of Iraq and the country's armed forces. At the same time, we respect regional and international commitments,” Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim Jaafari told RIA Novosti on Wednesday. “There are a number of obstacles on the path [of buying] S-400 systems. The Iraqi side is still negotiating, and when the final decision is made, it will be considered," Jaafari added.

According to State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert, Iraq has already been warned that purchasing S-400 systems could violate CAATSA, which imposes sanctions on countries which purchase weapons from Moscow.

As confirmed by this official State Department Briefing, it appears that the US foreign policy apparatus has been become little more than a lever to sell US weapons systems.

Expect the Fecal Matter Hitting the Rotary Impeller

We now have a date certain for when the US embassy will move to Jerusalem, so I would advise you to avoid travel to Israel in mid May:

The U.S. Embassy in Israel will move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in May, coinciding with the 70th anniversary of Israeli independence, the State Department said Friday.

The embassy, initially to be located in the current premises of the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem’s Arnona neighborhood, will expand in and near that site next year but will eventually move to new premises President Trump has said will be constructed, according to a statement issued by State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert.

The cost of that building is expected to run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Las Vegas casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, a major Republican donor, has offered to fund an unspecified part of the construction, according to an administration official who confirmed an Associated Press report.

I do believe that Jerusalem is the Israeli capital, though the final boundary between this capital is something to be negotiated between the Israelis and the Palestinians.


So on one level, I see the recognition of Jerusalem as a recognition of reality.


On another level, we know that we are going to see a LOT of unrest and disruption as a result, and I expect a spate of attacks and retaliations.

This will not be pretty.