This evening's music features Texas bluesman Lightnin' Hopkins.

Here are some stories from tonight's posting:

Pentagon destruction of evidence in Drake NSA leak case probed

Two government watchdog agencies are investigating whether the Pentagon inspector general destroyed evidence improperly during the high-profile leak investigation of former National Security Agency senior official Thomas Drake.

The Justice Department acknowledged the probes in a letter last week to a federal magistrate judge who recently received the allegations from Drake’s lawyers. The judge is determining whether she should take further action in a case that ended in 2011 when Drake pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge.

The Justice Department told the judge the inquiries are being conducted by a committee that looks into allegations of misconduct by inspectors general offices and the Office of Special Counsel, a federal agency that investigates whistleblower complaints.

The government’s handling of documents first became an issue during the evidence-gathering stage of Drake’s prosecution, when his criminal defense lawyers sought records related to his whistleblower cooperation with the Pentagon inspector general’s office in order to defend him.

At the time, the Justice Department told the judge that most of the “hard copy documents” related to the Pentagon inspector general’s office audit that Drake had cooperated with couldn’t be provided to the defense because they’d been destroyed “pursuant to a standard document destruction policy.”

Drake’s current lawyers, who didn’t represent him in the criminal case, told the court in a letter in April that they learned otherwise while representing Drake in his recent whistleblower claim against the NSA.

Drake’s lawyers wrote that the Pentagon inspector general’s office destroyed the documents “outside of normal policy and to impede . . . the criminal case.”

Where Does ISIS Get Those Wonderful Toys?

In the 1989 film Batman, after the caped crusader rescues a damsel in distress from the Joker using a fancy zipline gun, the clown prince of crime, played by Jack Nicholson, asks in bewilderment:

“Where does he get those wonderful toys?”

Especially upon seeing Batman’s nicest toys — his armored Batmobile and his military-grade Batwing fighter plane, etc — the Joker must have assumed his adversary was financed by some seriously deep pockets. And indeed, hidden behind the cowl was billionaire Bruce Wayne all along.

Similarly, upon seeing real-life fighters also garbed in black masks and jumpsuits, and running around the poverty-stricken Middle East with such “wonderful toys” as TOW anti-tank missiles, up-armored Humvees, M1A1 Abrams tanks, and fleets of gun-mounted Toyota pick-up trucks, any perceptive person must also assume that a wealthy patron lurked in the background.

Where do they get those wonderful Toyotas?

Indeed where does ISIS and al-Qaeda get those wonderful toys we so often see these days triumphantly bedecked with black flags? The ultimate source of virtually all of the jihadists’ gear are the deep pockets of the United States government and its client states. Uncle Sam is the veritable Bruce Wayne of Jihad. This was basically admitted in a recently disclosed Defense Intelligence Agency report. But anyone who bothered looking into it could have known this long ago, even if restricting one’s self to mainstream sources.

Most support for the jihadists has come by way of the aid the US offers, along with its allies, to the insurgency in Syria battling to overthrow the government of Bashar al-Assad. Washington has given this support even though the Pentagon admitted internally as early as 2012 that extremists including al-Qaeda were, as the DIA report said, “the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria.”

[To see how helpful your tax dollars are to ISIS, al-Qaida and other jihadis (not to mention the arms manufacturers and dealers making a killing, so to speak, on this conflict) click the link and read the rest of the article. -js]

Hmmm... a couple of nuclear-armed nations in a snit. What could possibly go wrong?

Indian military operation along Burma border opens new rift with Pakistan

An Indian military operation along its eastern border with Burma has Pakistani leaders rattled, resulting in threats of swift retaliation should India ever try similar manoeuvres along its western border with Pakistan.

The Pakistani statements – which include provocative reminders that India is not the only subcontinent power with nuclear arms – are once again exposing the deep-rooted suspicions and lingering potential for conflict between the longstanding rivals despite groundbreaking outreach to ease tensions.

It has been worse. The two countries have fought three major wars since 1947, engaged in a nuclear arms race in the 1980s and clashed in the 1990s. But the current uneasiness underscores the challenges for leaders on both sides seeking to overcome the rifts and shift to shared issues, such as regional economic cooperation, water resources and the rise of militant factions.

Over the past month, Pakistani leaders have accused India of sponsoring terrorist attacks inside Pakistan and slandering it at international forums. Historical grievances also have been dusted off, such as claims that India helped force the loss of Pakistani territory – which would become Bangladesh – more than four decades ago.

Obama successfully pressures UN to whitewash Israeli murders of Palestinian children

Last week, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon capitulated to pressure from the Obama administration and removed Israel’s armed forces from a child rights “blacklist.” The decision not only undermines a strong global tool necessary to protect children in armed conflict, but provides Israeli forces with tacit approval to continue committing egregious violations against children with impunity.

Each year, the Secretary-General submits a report on children and armed conflict to the UN Security Council that includes an annex, or “list of shame,” specifically identifying armed forces and groups found to commit grave violations against children. Israel’s armed forces were recommended by Leila Zerrougui, UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, for inclusion in the list for killing and maiming children and carrying out attacks against schools. This was rejected by Ban, as was the recommendation to list Palestinian armed groups.

The latest report, released on June 8, is itself a real contradiction. While Ban expressed deep alarm “at the extent of grave violations suffered by children as a result of Israeli military operations in 2014” and recognized the “unprecedented and unacceptable scale” of Israel’s military violence, he omitted Israel’s armed forces from the annex.

The report methodically details the devastating impact Israel’s prolonged military occupation had on Palestinian children, highlighting that 557 Palestinian children were killed in 2014. The total ranked third highest behind Afghanistan (710) and Iraq (679), and significantly more than in Syria (368). The report notes that at least 543 schools were damaged or destroyed in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), the highest recorded number of all situations in 2014. ...

During Israel’s military offensive on Gaza last summer, Defense for Children International Palestine found overwhelming and repeated evidence of direct targeting of children by Israeli drone-fired missiles and attacks carried out against schools. Disturbingly, Israel, the world’s largest exporter of aerial drones, killed 164 children in drone strikes during the offensive.

Heh, Israel is following Bush's and Obama's sterling example. Once again 'Merka is the world leader in human rights. We truly are the indispensable demockery!

Israeli Government Approves Bill Allowing Force-Feeding of Prisoners

Israel's cabinet has given the green light to a controversial bill that would permit the force-feeding of prisoners on hunger strike if their lives are in danger — despite fierce opposition from human rights groups and the country's medical association.

The draft law will still need to pass two further readings in parliament but Israel's Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, a leading proponent of the bill, said that cabinet's approval on Sunday had sent a clear message that Israel would "not blink in the face of any threat."

Prisoners — mainly Palestinians — held under administrative detention orders in Israeli jails often refuse food as a means of protest.

Administrative detention orders permit suspects to be held for six months without trial but can be renewed indefinitely, meaning that some detainees are held for years without ever being charged or knowing the evidence against them.

Writing on his Facebook page, Erdan described hunger striking by prisoners as tantamount to a "type of suicide attack" and a "threat" to security. "Alongside attempts to boycott and delegitimize Israel, hunger strikes of terrorists in prisons have become a means to threaten Israel," he wrote.

Syriza Left demands 'Icelandic' default as Greek defiance stiffens

Greek premier Alexis Tsipras threatens Europe's creditors with a "big no" unless they yield on debt servitude

The radical wing of Greece's Syriza party is to table plans over coming days for an Icelandic-style default and a nationalisation of the Greek banking system, deeming it pointless to continue talks with Europe's creditor powers.

Syriza sources say measures being drafted include capital controls and the establishment of a sovereign central bank able to stand behind a new financial system. While some form of dual currency might be possible in theory, such a structure would be incompatible with euro membership and would imply a rapid return to the drachma.

The confidential plans were circulating over the weekend and have the backing of 30 MPs from the Aristeri Platforma or 'Left Platform', as well as other hard-line groupings in Syriza's spectrum. It is understood that the nationalist ANEL party in the ruling coalition is also willing to force a rupture with creditors, if need be.

"This goes well beyond the Left Platform. We are talking serious numbers," said one Syriza MP involved in the draft.

"We are all horrified by the idea of surrender, and we will not allow ourselves to be throttled to death by European monetary union," he told the Telegraph.

IMF Report Admits IMF's Obsession with Capitalism Is Killing Prosperity

"By releasing this report, the IMF has shown that 'trickle-down' economics is dead; you cannot rely on the spoils of the extremely wealthy to benefit the rest of us."

In light of how the International Monetary Fund has spent most of its existence parading around the world telling governments to make their economies more friendly for multinational corporations by suppressing wages, restricting pensions, liberalizing industries, and more or less advocating they ignore the popular will of workers and the less fortunate—all in the name of market capitalism and endless economic growth—a new report released by the IMF on Monday contains an ironic warning: stop doing all that.

Though it perpetuates the idea that economic growth is the master to whom all should bow, the new research—conducted by the IMF's own economists and submitted under the title Causes and Consequences of Inequality (pdf)—argues that many of the policies promoted by the IMF have actually harmed nations by exacerbating widespread economic inequality. As many have noted, current disparities between the world's richest and poorest represent a nearly unprecedented level of global inequality which the report described as the "defining challenge of our time."

In order to strengthen economies, the report declares, nations should admit that "trickle-down" theories of wealth and prosperity do not work. In lieu of those, the study recommends raising wages and living standards for the bottom 20 percent, installing more progressive tax structures, improving worker protections, and instituting policies specifically designed to bolster the middle class. ...

No one should be fooled into thinking that the new research aims to alter the IMF's central commitment to advancing the financial interests of the global elite.

In fact, part of the argument presented in the paper is that such enormous levels of global economic inequality could seriously undermine the institution's public defense of capitalism's overall supremacy. "For example," the paper states, "[too much inequality] can lead to a backlash against growth-enhancing economic liberalization and fuel protectionist pressures against globalization and market-oriented reforms."

Bernie Sanders on Obama’s “Biggest Mistake”

In Barack Obama’s speech the night he won the 2008 election, he made a promise:

[A]bove all, I will ask you to join in the work of remaking this nation …

But Obama didn’t mean it.

In a new interview with the Daily Beast’s Eleanor Clift, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) identifies this as a key moment of failure by Obama:

“I have a lot of respect and admiration for Barack Obama,” [Sanders] said, but the “biggest mistake” he made after running “one of the great campaigns in American history” was saying to the legions of people who supported him, “Thank you very much for electing me, I’ll take it from here.”

“I will not make that mistake,” Sanders said.

Consider this, however: I think it’s unlikely that Obama’s demobilization of his supporters was actually a “mistake.” As Marshall Ganz, one of the architects of Obama’s 2008 organizing strategy, put it in 2010, Obama saw his supporters “like a tiger you can’t control”; Ganz speculated that the president’s real goal was simply to “keep the machine on for the next election.” ...

So while the Democratic party itself would have been much more powerful overall if Obama had kept his grassroots mobilized and involved, Obama himself and his most important donors and supporters would have been less powerful within the Democratic party.

Also of interest:

Dystopia here we come!

Privacy Advocates Walk Out in Protest Over U.S. Facial-Recognition Code of Conduct

The American middle class isn’t coming back — it’s going to die with the Baby Boomers