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"The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer."

-- Edward R. Murrow

News and Opinion

Reporter Seymour Hersh on "How America Took Out the Nord Stream Pipeline": Exclusive TV Interview

Did the US Blow Up Nord Stream If There is No Media to Report It?

Seymour Hersh has all of the credentials that usually give one gravitas in the world of journalism. As a freelance reporter he exposed the U.S. army’s 1969 massacre of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai and won a Pulitzer Prize for his efforts. He later worked at the New York Times and reported on high profile stories such as the Watergate revelations, and the CIA coup against the government of Chile. In 2004 Hersh exposed torture of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison for The New Yorker. None of these accomplishments helped Hersh when he recently provided evidence of what had long been obvious, that the Biden administration blew up the Nord Stream pipelines on September 26, 2022. In a 5,200 word article published on his Substack entitled How America Took Out the Nord Stream Pipeline , Hersh utilized highly placed sources who presented as one might say the “receipts” of how the deed was done. ...

Hersh’s article was a sensation online when it was published on February 8, 2023 but it has been ignored by major corporate media ever since. One has to ask if it really happened when the New York Times, Washington Post and television networks ignore what ought to be a huge news story. It isn’t hard to understand why the same individuals and institutions who act as state mouthpieces would want to sweep Hersh’s reporting under the rug. For months they have acted as scribes instead of as journalists. The days when they would compete to break a scoop that a president wanted covered up are long gone. They now go along with establishment narratives, and promote imperialism as much as the people they are tasked with covering and confronting. Not one person asked about Hersh’s revelations at the daily white house press briefing the day after it was published.

Not only have the media ignored what Hersh reported but Republicans who claim to oppose Biden and the Democrats have also been silent. There are impeachable offenses committed in Hersh’s account but the people who should be asking questions have demurred. Republicans were as eager as Democrats to end Nord Stream’s existence. The word collusion which was bandied about so much in recent years is apropos here and that means the Hersh story is now at the bottom of the sea politically. ...

Biden is the fox in charge of the hen house, preparing to ask congress for the biggest defense budget in history, in large part to replenish the weapons used in Ukraine. The people who are asked to accept austerity for themselves are largely ignorant of how the conflict started and why their money is used for every purpose except for those that benefit them. ... The media are behaving in a manner that violates their own ethics and that may in fact be criminal. Lest anyone forget, the post-World War II Nuremberg trials charged the German press with committing “propaganda as an instrument of war.” Now in the nuclear age the media in what is known as the “collective west” are acting in a similar fashion, covering up crimes and repeating lies as truth in the name of making and continuing war.

Corporate Media Smears Reporter Who Revealed U.S. Blew Up Nord Stream Pipeline!

Aaron Maté DESTROYS Dem Lying Senator Chris Murphy Over Nord Stream Explosion

Three objects shot down by US jets may be ‘benign’ balloons, White House says

Three unidentified objects shot down by US fighter jets since Friday may turn out to be balloons connected to “benign” commercial or research efforts, a White House official said on Tuesday.

The US has not found any evidence to connect the objects to China’s balloon surveillance program nor to any other country’s spy program, national security council spokesperson, John Kirby, told reporters.

“We haven’t seen any indication or anything that points specifically to the idea that these three objects were part of the [People’s Republic of China’s] spying program, or that they were definitively involved in external intelligence collection efforts,” he said.

Instead, a “leading explanation” may be that the objects were operated privately for commercial or research purposes, Kirby said, though no one has stepped forward to claim ownership.

Focused on aliens. Lavrov and Sudan. North Korea getting stronger

Russia To Sell Most Of Its Oil To “Friendly” Countries

Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak announced the country’s plans to sell more than 80% of its crude oil exports to “friendly” countries this year.

These “friendly” countries include countries such as China and India, which haven’t participated in product bans, sanctions against Russia, and oil and oil product price capping—as well as Sri Lanka, which is in the throes of an economic crisis. While India has been criticized for its Russian crude purchases, it has maintained that it must make good economic decisions by purchasing the cheapest crude oil possible. After India refines the crude into fuel, it is often exported to the United States and Europe.

Novak also said that it is these “friendly” countries that will also receive two-thirds of its refined oil products, adding that the country was also on the hunt for new markets.

Worth a click and a full read:

Shining a Light on Canada’s Much-Ignored Role in Peru’s Internal Conflict

With CAD $9.9 billion in assets, Canadian companies are Peru’s biggest investors in mineral exploration. That’s equivalent to 4.5% of Peru’s GDP. And Canada’s government is determined to not just protect that investment but to help it grow. ...

Like the US, Canada was quick to recognize Boluarte’s regime. Since mid-December Canada’s Ambassador to Peru (and coincidentally, Bolivia) Louis Marcotte has met not only with Boluarte but also Peru’s foreign minister, vulnerable populations minister and mining minister. As Canadian author and activist Yves Engler notes, it is rare for a Canadian ambassador to have so much contact with top officials of any government:

The diplomatic activity highlights Ottawa’s commitment to consolidating the shaky coup government, which has been rejected by many regional governments and has seen multiple ministers resign. The diplomatic encounters are also an indirect endorsement of Boluarte’s repression. Security forces have shot hundreds and detained many more.

In the case of the US, its ambassador to Peru, Lisa Kenna, a nine-year veteran at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and a former adviser to former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, met with Peru’s Defense Minister Gustavo Bobbio Rosas on December 6, just a day day before Castillo’s ouster. The timing of the meeting has stoked suspicions of US involvement in the coup, including from Mexico’s President Andrés Manuel Lopéz Obrador. ...

Other countries on the American continent, including Mexico, Colombia, Bolivia and Argentina, have taken a wildly different stance regarding Boluarte’s regime, refusing to recognize its legitimacy while calling for new elections and the release of Castillo. At the recent summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) a succession of national leaders denounced Boluarte’s ruthless repression of Peruvian protesters and called for her resignation.

By contrast, both Canada and the US have maintained their support while the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS) expressed its full backing, despite the mounting death toll. So far, at least 60 protesters have died at the hands of Peru’s police and armed forces, most of whom sustained gunshot wounds or injuries from other projectiles such as tear gas canisters. In a recent report, the Washington Office on Latin America, an NGO devoted to promoting human rights in the Americas, lambasted the culture of impunity at the top of the Peruvian government and security forces:

President Boluarte and her government say they are committed to ensuring public safety. However, attempting to achieve security through the disproportionate use of force is a predictably counterproductive strategy that, so far, has only intensified the protests and deepened the country’s crisis.

To date, no officials have been charged for the deaths that have taken place as a result of the actions of the security forces during the protests. Government representatives have called for the Public Ministry to investigate the abuses. But widespread impunity for human rights violations at the hands of the Peruvian security forces tempers hopes for effective accountability. Moreover, President Boluarte and her ministers have emphasized public messages that praise security forces and vilify demonstrators, congratulating police for their “immaculate” actions while blaming protesters for causing “chaos.” Such messages undermine confidence that the government is committed to ensuring accountability and preventing further abuses.

...

At the beginning of February, the US government expressed its ongoing “support for Peru and President Boluarte, and her efforts to affirm Peru’s democracy, ensuring peace, stability and the unity of the Peruvian people.” It even “encouraged the [Boluarte] government to continue taking steps to hold those responsible for acts of violence accountable.”

This came on the heels of news that Boluarte herself had formally requested permission from Peru’s Congress to “allow a foreign navy unit and armed troops” to enter the country. The ostensible reason for the request, issued on Jan 19, is to allow the entry, in April, of the Juan Sebastián de Elcano (A-71), a training ship of the Spanish Navy, as well as foreign military personnel. But the timing of the request is, to put it mildly, suspicious. And Spain is not only a member of NATO and Peru’s former colonial power; it is also one of Peru’s biggest arms suppliers.

Forensic Probe Confirms Chilean Poet Pablo Neruda Was Poisoned After Pinochet Coup

Pablo Neruda, the Chilean Nobel poet laureate, diplomat, and leftist politician who died days after Gen. Augusto Pinochet seized power in a 1973 U.S.-backed military coup, was poisoned to death, his nephew said Monday ahead of the expected publication of a new toxicology report later this week.

The revelation by the nephew, Rodolfo Reyes, confirms long-held suspicions that Neruda—an ardent communist—was murdered in the early days of Pinochet's far-right dictatorship. Reyes told Spain's EFE that laboratory testing showed a "great quantity" of clostridium botulinum—a neurotoxic bacteria that is one of the most poisonous known biological substances—in Neruda's body when he died.

Reyes said that clostridium botulinum "would have no reason to have been in Neruda's bones. What does this mean? That Neruda was murdered, there was an action in 1973 by agents of the state."

When the Pinochet coup occurred on September 11, 1973, 69-year-old Neruda was hospitalized with prostate cancer. While he was being treated, the poet made plans to go into exile in Mexico, where he had served as Chile's consul-general in the 1940s.

A close friend of Salvador Allende—the democratically elected socialist president who was overthrown by Pinochet's forces with the backing of U.S. military, intelligence, and business organs—Neruda would undoubtedly have been a vocal critic of the right-wing dictator and a major thorn in the regime's side.

Driver and bodyguard Manuel Araya has long said that a distressed Neruda called him from the hospital, claiming that someone injected him in the stomach while he was sleeping. Fearing the worst, Neruda left the hospital on September 23 and died hours later. His official cause of death was listed as the wasting effects of prostate cancer.

However, Gonzalo Martínez Corbalá, the Mexican ambassador to Chile at the time of the coup, said he saw Neruda two days before he died, and that although ill, he weighed 220 pounds, belying official claims of a "wasting" death.

A court-ordered exhumation and analysis of Neruda's remains that began in 2013 and involved forensic scientists in four nations led the Chilean government to announce two years later it was "highly probable that a third party" was involved in the poet's death. In 2017, an international team of scientists said they were "100% convinced" Neruda did not die of cancer.

During the early months of Pinochet's rule, other prominent leftists were arrested, tortured, and murdered in a reign of terror whose victims ultimately numbered in the tens of thousands. The renowned folk singer and guitarist Victor Yara, for example, had his hands smashed by torturers who mockingly asked him to play them a song. Instead, he sang the protest song "Venceremos"—"We Shall Win"—before he was shot more than 40 times.

Neruda, who won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature for "poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent's destiny and dreams," was called "the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language" by Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez, another Nobel laureate.

French parliament rejects key article of pension reforms

US inflation eases again for seventh consecutive month

US inflation continued to cool in January, rising at an annual rate of 6.4%, according to figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The consumer price index (CPI) – which measures a basket of goods and services – has now fallen for seven consecutive months, down from a four-decade high of 9.1% last June, and down from an annual rate of 6.5% in December.

On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.5% from 0.1% in December, showing the continuing strength of inflationary pressures as the cost of housing/shelter rose again.

The fall was smaller than some economists had expected, but January’s rise was still the smallest 12-month increase since the period ending October 2021. After subtracting volatile food and energy prices, the so-called “core index” rose 5.6% over the last 12 months, its smallest 12-month increase since December 2021.

While the fall is welcome news and has mitigated some of the cost of living crisis that has seen the price of goods from eggs and orange juice to rents and healthcare soar, the latest reading is still far higher than the Federal Reserve’s annual target rate of 2% inflation.

The still-rising cost of shelter accounted for nearly half the monthly “all-items” increase, rising 0.7% over the month and 7.9% higher than a year ago. The indexes for food, gasoline, and natural gas also contributed to the rise.

Fears of renewed FBI abuse of power after informant infiltrated BLM protests

The FBI’s use of an informant to infiltrate Black Lives Matter in Denver during the wave of protests over the 2020 police killing of George Floyd has prompted concern in Congress that the federal agency is once again abusing its powers to harass and intimidate minority groups.

Ron Wyden, the Democratic senator from Oregon, is calling for the FBI to explain how it came to recruit a violent felon as an informant who then went on to gain prominence among Denver racial justice activists. The informant is alleged to have encouraged protesters to engage in increasingly violent demonstrations while trying to entrap them in criminal misdeeds.

“If the allegations are true, the FBI’s use of an informant to spy on first amendment-protected activity and stoke violence at peaceful protests is an outrageous abuse of law-enforcement resources and authority,” Wyden told the Guardian.

Wyden sits on the Senate intelligence committee which has oversight over federal intelligence-gathering agencies, including the FBI. He also fought for public disclosure of Donald Trump’s deployment in 2020 of more than 750 officers to his home town of Portland, Oregon, based on what he called “politicised and false intelligence reports”.

The FBI’s infiltration of Black Lives Matter in Denver “appears to show another instance of the Trump administration trampling on the rights of Americans in order to divide our country and gain a political advantage”, Wyden said. “The FBI owes the public a full accounting of its actions, including how anyone responsible for attempting to entrap and discredit racial justice activists will be held accountable.”

California senator Dianne Feinstein, 89, announces she will not seek re-election

Dianne Feinstein , the 89-year-old senator from California who has served in the chamber for three decades, said she will not seek re-election in 2024.

“I am announcing today I will not run for re-election in 2024 but intend to accomplish as much for California as I can through the end of next year when my term ends,” Feinstein said in a statement.

Her announcement has been long anticipated and comes after several fellow Democrats have already announced plans to run for her seat. The news also comes after years of speculation about the senator’s mental fitness and concerns that Feinstein, who would be 91 by election day, was experiencing memory problems. ...

Feinstein told colleagues that her husband’s death last year had been hard, and that she was ready to step away from public life, according to the Associated Press. She is the oldest member of Congress and the longest serving US senator from California.

Fellow California Democrats are already fighting over the rare Senate opening Feinstein’s retirement will create. Among the candidates are Katie Porter – the young, southern California representative known for wielding a whiteboard at House hearings – and Adam Schiff, a liberal darling who led the first impeachment of Donald Trump. Representative Barbara Lee has also reportedly told colleagues she is running.

CRINGE: Sen. Dianne Feinstein UNAWARE Of Own Retirement Announcement When Asked

Nikki Haley to seek Republican nomination for 2024 presidential election

“I’m Nikki Haley, and I’m running for president,” Donald Trump’s former United Nations ambassador said in a video released on Tuesday.

The 51-year-old’s run – which was widely expected – breaks a promise she made two years ago to not challenge the ex-Republican president for the Oval Office. But she had indicated recently that she would go back on her word, saying the country’s economy was too distressed for her to stand by, and that it needed a new generation of leaders – President Joe Biden is 80, and Trump is 76.

As of Tuesday morning, no other major Republican candidate beside Trump and Haley had announced bids aiming to unseat Biden, who has said he intends to seek a second four-year term.

Other Republicans expected to eventually join the fray include Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor; Mike Pence, Trump’s former vice-president; Mike Pompeo, ex-secretary of state; and South Carolina senator Tim Scott.

Haley is vying to become the first female president after a poll published last week found that her entry into a 2024 Republican primary would be enough to keep Trump ahead of his only current close rival: DeSantis.

New Zealand minister decries climate crisis ‘lost decades’ in wake of Cyclone Gabrielle

New Zealand’s climate change minister has made a furious speech excoriating parliament for lost decades of “bickering” over the climate crisis, as Cyclone Gabrielle devastates the country.

“As I stand here today, I struggle to find words to express what I am thinking and feeling about this particular crisis,” James Shaw told parliament on Tuesday. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt as sad or as angry about the lost decades that we spent bickering and arguing about whether climate change was real or not, whether it was caused by humans or not, whether it was bad or not, whether we should do something about it or not, because it is clearly here now, and if we do not act, it will get worse.”

New Zealand is in a national state of emergency as it continues to be battered by the cyclone, which has caused widespread flooding and enormous destruction across the North Island. It is the third national emergency to be declared in the country’s history. The scale of damage is not yet known, with entire regions cut off from road access, electricity and mobile networks, neighbourhoods submerged by flood waters and landslides destroying homes and state highways.

Shaw, who is co-leader of the Green party, attributed the scale of the disaster to the climate crisis, saying: “There will be people who say it’s ‘too soon’ to talk about these things … but we are standing in it right now. This is a climate change-related event. The severity of it, of course, made worse by the fact that our global temperatures have already increased by 1.1 degrees.

“We need to stop making excuses for inaction. We cannot put our heads in the sand when the beach is flooding. We must act now.”

Briahna Joy Gray: East Palestine Ohio Train DISASTER Caused By CORPORATE GREED; Media Is COMPLICIT

The Corporate Campaign To Greenwash Natural Gas

Last month, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) signed legislation to call natural gas a "green energy." The law was pushed by conservative dark money groups and passed by Republican lawmakers backed by the oil and gas industry. A few weeks later, former congressman and 2022 Ohio Democratic Senate candidate Tim Ryan joined a fossil fuel front group that claims “natural gas is accelerating our transition to a clean energy future.”

These greenwashing efforts are examples of how politicians from both parties are helping the fossil fuel industry’s campaign to promote the use of natural gas and brand it as a climate-friendly energy source. At times, this help has entailed former elected officials getting hired by the industry. The efforts come as the Biden administration considers banning gas stoves, based on concerns about asthma. Some cities have banned natural gas hookups in new buildings, while others are considering a ban.

Despite the claims of the energy industry and their political allies that natural gas is a climate-friendly alternative to other fossil fuels, the production and use of natural gas, which is essentially methane, has a negative impact on both the planet and public health. Natural gas, which people use to heat their homes and power their stoves, contributes to increasing global temperatures. Experts warn the effects of natural gas leaks could make its use even worse for the planet than coal.

The American Gas Association, a gas industry lobbying group, has described natural gas as “the earth’s cleanest traditional fuel,” claiming that its use cuts emissions. Oil and gas giant ExxonMobil’s website calls natural gas a cleaner fuel, while Chevron says it’s the “​​cleanest burning conventional fuel.” Other companies are pushing the idea of “green” liquified natural gas, the form in which gas is stored and transported. In 2019, the Trump Administration even tried to rebrand natural gas as "freedom gas."

But research has shown that methane is worse for the environment than fossil fuel companies let on. Methane molecules, the main component of natural gas, are as much as 90 times more effective at trapping heat than carbon dioxide molecules are. While methane releases far less carbon than coal, its use contributes to rising global temperatures. For years, energy companies have downplayed the amount of methane they are leaking into the atmosphere. Researchers have found that the effects of methane leaks during the fracking and transportation process could outweigh the supposed climate benefits of using natural gas over coal.

‘They aren’t mean and they aren’t trying to get you’: saving the copperbelly water snake

The copperbelly water snake – named for its tangerine-orange underside – inhabited what was one of the largest wetland areas in North America. Roughly the size of Connecticut and stretching from Fort Wayne in Indiana across much of north-west Ohio, the Great Black Swamp was home to elk, wolves, mountain lions and black bears.

In the mid-19th century, farmers began to clear the trees and drain the swamp to access the fertile soil hidden beneath the water. In just five decades, the Great Black Swamp was dry.

Today, the copperbelly water snake lays claim to just 50 sq km (20 sq miles) of remnant swamp forest in the tri-state area – slightly smaller than Manhattan Island. Though the exact number of the reptiles is not known, experts estimate that fewer than 100 individuals, possibly as few as 40, remain. “I think they will be gone within 20 years,” says Nathan Herbert, a land steward with the Nature Conservancy, an international nonprofit organisation.

He believes saving the copperbelly water snake is essential to the region’s ecology because it is “an umbrella species” – the preservation and conservation of this one snake also protects habitat for dozens of other declining species that rely on the swamp forest, including the rare bobolink blackbird and the checkerspot butterfly. ...

The US Fish and Wildlife Service is partnering with Toledo zoo, south of Detroit, to captive breed copperbelly water snakes. The zoo has successfully reared other declining native species, including the hellbender salamander and the Blanding’s turtle. No one, however, had tried to breed copperbelly water snakes in captivity before. ... The snakes have adjusted quickly to captivity at Toledo zoo. “They are doing really well,” says Megan Seymour. “They are eating, shedding and behaving as they should.” ...

Just four months after she was caught, one of the females gave birth to 24 babies, the first copperbelly water snakes to be born in captivity.

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Ukraine War - The Upcoming Duel Of Speeches

The Buildup To War In Ukraine - February 14 2022

How the US crushed the struggle for a Somali nation

Diana Johnstone: Demonstrate Together

Scott Ritter: The Best Speech I Never Gave

Viewpoint: The Problem With the Feb. 19 Anti-War Rally

Patrick Lawrence: Objectivity and Its Discontents

Understanding Money and the Dollar System: Radhika Desai & Michael Hudson at Geopolitical Hour

Climate Groups Cheer Khanna- Whitehouse Bill to Tax Big Oil Windfall Profits

Dancing cats, peeping owls and a field of fire: Sony World photography national winners – in pictures

Mike Pompeo: DEATH To Snowden, Don't Release JFK Files

Indian Gov RAIDS BBC Office After Censoring Documentary

Rail Worker EXPOSES Corruption Behind Ohio Train DISASTER

Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon resigns: What future for the SNP?

NY Times Scrubs Truth From Own Headline About Syria Sanctions

A Little Night Music

Memphis Slim (w/Matt "Guitar" Murphy) - I'm lost without you

Memphis Slim - St. Louis Boogie

Memphis Slim – Fourty Years Or More

Memphis Slim - Let the Good Times Roll

Memphis Slim - Steppin' Out

Memphis Slim with Buddy Guy - You Called Me At Last

Memphis Slim - The Comeback

Memphis Slim – Caledonia

Memphis Slim w Peter Green - Boogie Woogie 1 9 7 0

Memphis Slim – Ballin' The Jack (I Feel So Good)

Memphis Slim w Peter Green - Boogin' And Bluesin', Wind Gonna Rise