We need to be protected from the Truth

In the true Orwellian fashion now typifying 2016, a bill to implement the U.S.’ very own de facto Ministry of Truth has been quietly introduced in Congress — its lack of fanfare appropriate given the bill’s equally subtle language. As with any legislation attempting to dodge the public spotlight, however, the Countering Foreign Propaganda and Disinformation Act of 2016 marks a further curtailment of press freedom and another avenue to stultify avenues of accurate information.
Introduced by Congressmen Adam Kinzinger and Ted Lieu, H.R. 5181 seeks a “whole-government approach without the bureaucratic restrictions” to counter “foreign disinformation and manipulation,” which they believe threaten the world’s “security and stability.”
“As Russia continues to spew its disinformation and false narratives, they undermine the United States and its interests in places like Ukraine, while also breeding further instability in these countries,” Kinzinger explained in a statement. “The United States has a role in countering these destabilizing acts of propaganda, which is why I’m proud to introduce [the aforementioned bill]. This important legislation develops a comprehensive U.S. strategy to counter disinformation campaigns through interagency cooperation and on-the-ground partnerships with outside organizations that have experience in countering foreign propaganda.”
Make no mistake — this legislation isn’t proposing some team of noble fact-finders, chiseling away to free the truth from the façades of various foreign governmental narratives for the betterment of American and allied populations. If passed, this legislation will allow cumbrously pro-‘American’ propaganda to infiltrate cable, online, and mainstream news organizations wherever the government deems necessary.

As President I will commit war crimes

In her self-declared “major” foreign policy speech on June 2, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton indirectly admitted that the U.S. government’s drone killings of family members of suspected militants, namely Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, if intentional, was a war crime.
Clinton blasted Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump for saying “he would order our military to carry out torture and the murder of civilians who are related to suspected terrorists — even though those are war crimes.”
Yet, while she served as secretary of state, Clinton’s own U.S. government administration may have overseen the very atrocity that she accidentally acknowledged is a war crime.
Hundreds of civilians, many of whom were innocent family members of suspected militants, have been killed in U.S. drone strikes in Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia and more. If any of these killings were intentional, they were war crimes.

Who needs Trump to start a trade war with China when we have Obama

The US has given the go-ahead for the country’s largest steel producer to seek a ban on imports from Chinese rivals, in the first known case in which trade sanctions could be used in retaliation for alleged China government-backed hacking of commercial secrets.
The move comes ahead of a meeting of senior US and Chinese officials in Beijing next week. It highlights the increasingly aggressive tactics the US steel industry is using to fight back against the flood of cheap Chinese steel that has hit global markets in recent years, as well as the growing international concerns about industrial overcapacity in China.
Depending on the outcome the development could eventually result in the next president authorising a blanket ban on imports of Chinese steel in retaliation for the alleged hacking.

The worst possible scenario for Fallujah

New reports emerging today reveal that the Shi’ite militias involved in the offensive against the overwhelmingly Sunni city “detained” the fleeing civilians by the hundreds, hauling them off to the militia-run sections of the Mazraa Army Base, where they are held incommunicado.
In keeping with the militias’ track record in previous “liberation” of Sunni territory, the detainees who have been freed, which are a small minority of the overall number of captives, showed signs of severe torture, and at least four died of their injuries already.
Those released say they were reportedly tortured by militia members asking them if they were ISIS members, before ultimately being released. Anbar Provincial MP Sheikh Raja al-Issawi criticized the move, and pushed for a government investigation of the matter.
That’s unlikely to happen, as the government is so deeply beholden to the militias, and indeed so many of the militias’ top leaders are also politically powerful figures, that they really are above the law in Iraq.

Killing children is OK after all

The Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi rebels in Yemen has been removed from a UN blacklist of states and groups that violate children's rights in conflict.
Saudi Arabia protested after the UN released a report saying the coalition was responsible for 60% of the child deaths and injuries in Yemen last year.

Hard to believe I'm reading this

Yemen: The parties to over a year of civil war in Yemen have agreed to release all child prisoners they are holding, U.N. envoy to peace talks in Kuwait Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed said on his official Twitter account Monday. “The unconditional release of children was agreed, and the mechanics of the release of detainees in the coming days was addressed,” Cheikh Ahmed wrote....
It is not clear how many child prisoners are being held, but Yemeni political sources say that the Houthis and the government submitted in late May a list of almost 7,000 names of prisoners they say are being held by the other side.

2020 milestone

Still, millionaires currently control 47 percent of the world's wealth, and will control 52 percent by 2020, according to the report. And the richest of the rich will gain the most, especially in the U.S. Those worth more than $20 million in the U.S. will control 29 percent of the country's wealth by 2020, up from 24 percent in 2015 and 20 percent in 2010, according to the report.

Those worth less than $1 million will see their share of wealth shrink to 29 percent of the total, from 34 percent in 2015 and 40 percent in 2010.

The trend will likely accelerate in the next five years, as the largest wealth gains are expected to go to those at the very top of the top. U.S. households worth $20 million or more will see their wealth growth by more than 7.6 percent over the next five years, according to the report. Those in the U.S. worth $1 million to $20 million will see there wealth grow 5.7 percent, while those worth less than $1 million will see their wealth grow 1.2 percent.