Trump era: Fascist dawn, or road to liberation?

[angelburst29]

U.S. President Donald Trump attacked Prime Minister Theresa May and her ambassador to Washington on Monday while Britain voiced regret for the leak of confidential memos in which the diplomat called Trump's administration "dysfunctional" and "inept."

Trump assails Britain's May, ambassador to U.S. who called his administration 'inept'

The memos from Kim Darroch, ambassador to Washington, were divulged to a Sunday newspaper, annoying Trump and embarrassing London.

“Contact has been made with the Trump administration, setting out our view that we believe the leak is unacceptable,” May’s spokesman told reporters. “It is, of course, a matter of regret that this has happened.”

Trump responded on Twitter by criticizing May’s handling of Brexit and saying she disregarded his advice.

“What a mess she and her representatives have created,” he wrote. “I do not know the Ambassador, but he is not liked or well thought of within the U.S. We will no longer deal with him.”

“The good news for the wonderful United Kingdom is that they will soon have a new Prime Minister. While I thoroughly enjoyed the magnificent State Visit last month, it was the Queen who I was most impressed with!” he wrote.

Hours after Trump’s tweet, May’s spokesman reiterated Britain’s position that the leak was unfortunate and said Darroch “continues to have the prime minister’s full support.”

Trade minister Liam Fox, who is visiting Washington, told BBC radio he would apologize to Trump’s daughter Ivanka, whom he was due to meet.

“I will be apologizing for the fact that either our civil service or elements of our political class have not lived up to the expectations that either we have or the United States has about their behavior, which in this particular case has lapsed in a most extraordinary and unacceptable way,” he said.

“Malicious leaks of this nature ... can actually lead to a damage to that relationship, which can therefore affect our wider security interest.”

It was unclear whether his message had been relayed before Trump posted his tweet. It was the U.S. president’s second broadside against the British ambassador, whom he criticized on Sunday as not having “served the UK well.”

Britain is hoping to strike a major trade deal with its closest ally after it leaves the European Union, an exit scheduled for Oct. 31.

‘SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES’ FOR LEAKER
In confidential memos to his government dating from 2017 to the present, Darroch said reports of in-fighting in the White House were “mostly true” and last month described confusion within the administration over Trump’s decision to call off a military strike on Iran.

“We don’t really believe this Administration is going to become substantially more normal; less dysfunctional; less unpredictable; less faction riven; less diplomatically clumsy and inept,” Darroch wrote in one memo. Ministers said the government did not agree with Darroch.

Foreign minister Jeremy Hunt, one of two men who might replace May by the end of the month, said: “I have made it clear that I don’t share the ambassador’s assessment of either the U.S. administration or relations with the U.S. administration, but I do defend his right to make that frank assessment.”

He promised “serious consequences” for whoever had leaked the memos.

Nigel Farage, leader of the Brexit Party and long a thorn in the side of British governments, said figures such as Darroch would be “not be around” if ex-foreign minister Boris Johnson, the other candidate seeking to replace May, was chosen by Conservative Party members.

Despite being close to Trump, Farage ruled himself out of becoming Britain’s next ambassador in Washington, telling BBC radio: “I don’t think I’m the right man for that job.”

An inquiry was under way to determine who was behind the second serious disclosure of confidential material this year. May’s spokesman said police would be involved if there was evidence of criminality.

Two months ago, May fired defense minister Gavin Williamson after secret discussions in the National Security Council about Chinese telecoms firm Huawei were leaked to the media, and an inquiry concluded that he was responsible.

Williamson denied any involvement and police said there was no reason for a criminal investigation.

Slideshow (3 Images)
Trump assails Britain's May, ambassador to U.S. who called his...

Ambassador leaks are a 'matter of regret', Britain tells U.S.
Britain’s government has told Washington that leaks of memos in which the UK ambassador described U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration as “dysfunctional” were a matter of regret, the Prime Minister Theresa May’s spokesman said on Monday.

The memos from Kim Darroch, the ambassador to Washington, were leaked to a Sunday newspaper, annoying U.S. President Donald Trump and triggering demands on the British side to find out who had disclosed them.

“Contact has been made with the Trump administration setting out our view that we believe the leak in unacceptable. It is, of course, a matter of regret that this has happened,” May’s spokesman told reporters.

Pompeo launches commission to study human rights role

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at a news conference on human rights at the State Department in Washington, U.S., July 8, 2019. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday launched a panel to re-examine the role of human rights in U.S. foreign policy, drawing criticism from lawmakers and activists who said it was an attempt to minimize abortion and gay rights.

Slideshow (2 Images)
Pompeo launches commission to study human rights role

U.N.'s Bachelet 'appalled' at U.S. treatment of migrants and refugees
U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet is "appalled" at the conditions in which the United States is keeping detained migrants and refugees, including children, her office said in a statement on Monday.

Australia tracks Chinese warship headed toward U.S.-Australia war games

Australian defense officials said on Monday they were tracking a Chinese surveillance ship that is expected to position itself just outside of its territorial waters to monitor military exercises between Australia and the United States.

Around 25,000 Australian and U.S. military personnel on board battleships equipped with strike jets will over the next month participate in bi-annual Talisman Sabre war games.

Lieutenant General Greg Bilton, chief of joint operations at the Australian Defence Force, said the Chinese surveillance vessel was probably headed to Australia’s northeast coast to get a first-hand look at the military exercises.

“We’re tracking it. We don’t know yet its destination but we are assuming that it will come down to the east coast of Queensland and we will take appropriate measures,” Bilton told reporters in Brisbane, the state capital of Queensland.

 

[Tuatha de Danaan]

With regards to the above mentioned Leak to the Press. More of the same drivel that bombards us every day. Government and papers are controlled from same source. Nothing was LEAKED just printed to pretend there is division between UK and US Government. Mike Pompeo speaking at a news conference about HUMAN RIGHTS.... just farcical and utterly depressing.

 

[angelburst29]

Shanahan drops bid to lead Pentagon, citing ‘painful’ past

Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan stepped down Tuesday before his formal nomination ever went to the Senate. (Reuters/File photo)

WASHINGTON: After months of unexplained delays, Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan stepped down Tuesday before his formal nomination ever went to the Senate, citing a “painful” family situation that would hurt his children and reopen “wounds we have worked years to heal.”

President Donald Trump announced Shanahan’s departure in a tweet, and said that Army Secretary Mark Esper would be the new acting Pentagon Chief.

William Moran: Trump nominee to top Navy post retires amid investigation into "inappropriate professional relationship"
Trump nominee to top Navy post retires amid investigation into ‘inappropriate professional relationship’

Admiral cites probe into "the nature of some of my personal email correspondences" as reason behind sudden retirement. (AP)

Donald Trump’s nominee to become the top officer in the US Navy has instead announced his retirement amid allegations of an inappropriate professional relationship with a former public affairs official.

Admiral William Moran announced the sudden decision on Sunday, likely adding to the perception of turmoil in the Pentagon ranks, less than a month after Pat Shanahan abruptly withdrew from consideration to be Defense Secretary after serving as the acting Secretary for six months.

Leaders of the individual military services, both civilian and uniformed, play less critical roles in national security than the defence secretary, and they are not in the chain of military command. But they are responsible for ensuring that the armed forces are trained, equipped and prepared for combat and other roles.

Mr. Moran had been vetted for promotion to the top uniformed position in the Navy, nominated by the President and confirmed by the US Senate in May to succeed Admiral John Richardson as Chief of Naval Operations and as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Instead, he said in a written statement on Sunday evening that he told Mr Spencer he decided to decline his appointment as the next chief of naval operations and requested to be allowed to retire. Mr Moran said his decision to decline the appointment and to instead retire was based also on what he called an open investigation into "the nature of some of my personal email correspondence over the past couple of years."

"As painful as it is to submit my request to retire, I will not be an impediment whatsoever to the important service that you and your families continue to render the nation every day," Mr Moran wrote.

Richard Spencer, Secretary of the Navy, responded to the admiral’s decision with a statement saying it was “recently brought to my attention that over the past two years [Mr Moran] maintained a professional relationship with an individual who was held accountable and counselled for failing to meet the values and standards of the Naval profession.”

“While I admire his faithful service and commitment to the Navy, this decision on his part to maintain that relationship has caused me to call his judgment into question,” he continued. “Therefore, today I accepted Adm. Moran's request to retire."

Reports indicated the relationship in question was between Mr Moran and Chris Servello, who was removed from his position as public affairs adviser to Mr Richardson in 2017 and given a non-punitive letter of reprimand for drinking and fraternising with junior officers during and after a December 2016 Navy Christmas party.

Mr Servello was accused of making unwanted sexual passes while dressed as Santa at the party. No charges were filed against him. He retired from the Navy last May at the rank of commander.

Mr Servello had previously worked for Mr Moran as a public affairs officer.

With Mr Moran's departure, Mr Richardson will extend his tenure as Navy chief and Mr Spencer said he would recommend a new candidate for nomination by the President. Mr Richardson's official retirement date is in September.

Mr Moran's downfall adds to an unusually long list of leadership questions facing the Pentagon, which has been operating without a Senate-confirmed defense secretary since Jim Mattis resigned in December 2018. There also is no confirmed deputy secretary of defense, and several other key leadership positions are about to turn over.

Trump blasts 'foolish' UK PM May and her 'wacky' envoy over leaked memos

U.S. President Donald Trump lashed out at "foolish" British Prime Minister Theresa May and her "wacky" Washington ambassador on Tuesday, stepping up a tirade against a close ally whose envoy had branded his administration inept.

Trump says won't deal with UK ambassador after leak of 'inept' memos
Donald Trump said he would not deal with Britain's ambassador to Washington after a leak of confidential memos in which the diplomat described the U.S. president's administration as "inept".

~~~
As a side note: Unexplained death of an American Scientist
Missing American scientist found dead in Crete
ATHENS July 9, 2019 - An American scientist who disappeared a week ago on the island of Crete was found dead on Tuesday, her employers said.

Suzanne Eaton, 60, a molecular biologist at the world-renowned Max Planck Institute in Dresden, Germany, was attending a conference in the town of Chania when she was reported missing on July 2.

Greek authorities said a body was discovered on a rough and rocky site inside a World War Two bunker, about 8-10 km (5-6 miles) from where she was last seen.

“It is with enormous sadness and regret that we announce the tragic demise of our dearest friend and colleague, Suzanne Eaton. The police recovered her body during the evening of 8th July,” the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics said in a statement.

Police said further forensic tests were underway. The cause of death was not immediately known.

“Searching for Suzanne,” a Facebook page created by Eaton’s family, said she was last known to be playing the piano on July 2, and is believed to have gone for a run later that afternoon.

Her passport, wallet, phone, cash, and cycling shoes were in her hotel room but her running shoes were missing, it said.

Dresden University’s Max Planck Institute, where Eaton was a research group leader, described her in a statement on its website as “a leading scientist in her field, a strong athlete, runner and senior black belt in Tae Kwon Do.”

 

[Cosmos]

Interestingly Fox slowly but surely seems to change their stands in regards to Trump. Seems like they are getting back into the business of defaming him and what his administration does, at least according to Trump himself. On July 7 Trump tweeted:

Watching @FoxNews weekend anchors is worse than watching low ratings Fake News @CNN, or Lyin’ Brian Williams (remember when he totally fabricated a War Story trying to make himself into a hero, & got fired. A very dishonest journalist!) and the crew of degenerate Comcast (NBC/MSNBC) Trump haters, who do whatever Brian & Steve tell them to do. Like CNN, NBC is also way down in the ratings. But @FoxNews, who failed in getting the very BORING Dem debates, is now loading up with Democrats & even using Fake unsourced @nytimes as a “source” of information (ask the Times what they paid for the Boston Globe, & what they sold it for (lost 1.5 Billion Dollars), or their old headquarters building disaster, or their unfunded liability? @FoxNews is changing fast, but they forgot the people who got them there!

On July 8 Trump tweeted:

Impossible to believe that @FoxNews has hired @donnabrazile, the person fired by @CNN (after they tried to hide the bad facts, & failed) for giving Crooked Hillary Clinton the questions to a debate, something unimaginable. Now she is all over Fox, including Shep Smith, by far their lowest rated show. Watch the @FoxNews weekend daytime anchors, who are terrible, go after her big time. That’s what they want - but it sure is not what the audience wants!

One wonders of course why and now.... Seems the PTB still aren't all that happy with Trump, especially I'm afraid because of his rational/human stands towards nonsense like killing 150 innocent Iranian people over an unmanned drone, risking a major war with many more people dying.

 

[SummerLite]

Interestingly Fox slowly but surely seems to change their stands in regards to Trump. Seems like they are getting back into the business of defaming him and what his administration does, at least according to Trump himself. On July 7 Trump tweeted:

Hmmm, I don't know, Fox still seems overwhelmingly pro Trump to me still and I watch daily. Donna Brazille is pretty nauseating to watch but I've only seen her on once and I don't know why she's there. Trump has mentioned her and Fox several times so its a sure bone of contention for him. The Democrats are offered as a counter point and are mostly cast in a ridiculous light. Coverage of the Radical Dems has been SEARING, so justified and inspiring to see.

 

[Cosmos]

Trump calls in a public social media meeting in the white house and makes it clear that fake news content and censorship is not ok.

 

[Cosmos]

I've recently watched the following extensive interview with Tucker Carlson in which he mentions a number of interesting details about who Trump is, how he operates, his makeup and his close relationship with him. The video was mentioned before elsewhere. It starts at 15:15:

A couple of interesting points Carlson makes, which might give us a better clue on Trump (if what he says is true of course, which I tend to think so):

- Tucker Carlson says "Oh, I know [Trump] well..."

- Tucker says he knows Trump for about 20 years

- Tucker says Trump is not the guy (or sort of person) that comes to Washington and transforms the system because "he is not capable of that and not interested in that" since Washington:

"is a very specific town" that has for example "a highly complex legislative process" that Trump "doesn't understand and doesn't seek to understand". "He is not going to be the guy who runs these nine policies and then effects them ones elected; get's them to the congress, gets them to the agencies etc., because he can't... That's not his role... It is very frustrating actually if you are from DC like me to watch that, [because] you are like: "Wow, wait a second, get the energy department under control!" Not gonna happen... There are three million executive branch employees versus Trump, ok [do you understand?]...[...] But I'm just saying that, look, the permanent class in DC (and I live right in the center of them), [...] they hat Trump because he is a threat to them. But why do they hate him? They hate him, not because he is a right-winger (he is hardly a right-winger actually), they hate him because he is the guy who says the obvious things...

- Tucker mentions a story in regard to the last bolted part in the Quote above, of when he went to Helsinki [the famous Putin-Trump meeting] and interviewed Trump, that something "crystallized in him at that point in time" that "he will never forget" in regard to understanding Trump and why many powerful people hate him (and not just powerful ones) when something happened during that interview off camera when he asked Trump a question:

"I said something like; "Sir can I ask you something about NATO?" and [Trump] goes; "Why do we have NATO?!" And for someone who is like a cold war kid [as I am], I was like [speaking to myself in the head]; "Why, well I like NATO." Then [Trump says]: "You know the Soviet Union fell in 1991, wasn't the point of NATO to keep them from invading Western Europe? But they [the Soviet Union] don't exist anymore! Why do we still have them?"

And I'm trying to search for a good answer [in my head] and I couldn't find one!... And so Trump then [goes on to] repeat that [statement/question] in public and everyone is like; "Well [what the heck!?], shut up! [toward Trump], what are you working for, Putin [or what]?"

And I thought [to myself], this is what Trump does; he comes in, in his kind of autistic way, and asks the obvious questions at the core of whatever the issue is, which is the one question everyone has been avoiding because they don't have the answer to it... So like [Carlson mentions some of the core question Trump has brought to public attention at this point in the interview], well, why do we sign a trade agreement and let the other signatories ignore the terms? Why do we have a border?

So these [and other questions] are not complicated questions, they are very obvious questions, but because they are unanswered and unanswerable in some cases, they expose sort of the mediocrity of our ruling class... It is like they actually don't know what they are doing is the truth...

I would highly recommend watching that segment and what follows after it. I'll stop there for the moment, but Carlson has a lot of interesting things to say after that point about Trump and the ruling class as well.

What strikes me as particularly fascinating is Carlson's assessment on how Trump thinks and speaks in a kind of autistic/childish curiosity kind of way. Trump seems to posses some kind of ability to ask obvious core questions a normal decent human being would ask, in a childishly open and curious way, to find out the real answers to it, with not many assumptions and preconceived notions put into the questions and without fear of public embarrassment to ask them. That might be a core pillar that makes Trump so unique and very dangerous to the ruling class, who have a completely different psychopathic makeup.

That sort of brings me to another pretty interesting video in which Jimmy Dore sort of breaks down how maybe Tucker Carlson himself (and people like him) are for Trump the sources he seeks out to get advice from, in regards to pressing questions, like the one about starting a war with Iran. It could very well be that Carlson himself was the one who in the final analysis persuaded Trump to not listen to his notorious national security advisers in regards to Iran:

 

[Oxajil]

I thought this was a good short vid, about Fake News. Trump retweeted it and also retweeted some responses to the video:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1149536949662674944

 

[Cosmos]

I thought this was a good short vid, about Fake News. Trump retweeted it and also retweeted some responses to the video:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1149536949662674944

Good one!

 

[Cosmos]

Trump calls in a public social media meeting in the white house and makes it clear that fake news content and censorship is not ok.

The Media wasn't very happy about this meeting Trump initiated at all. The most common thing they said was that he invited a whole crowd of "conspiracy theorists" to the meeting. The media was even less happy when Trump kicked them out so that the crowd and the President could have a private Q & A session:

 

[sToRmR1dR]

Trump to the Democrats: 'Not happy in America? - Get the f**k out!'

If People Not Happy in America, They Can Leave - Trump After Posting Tweets Targeting Congresswomen

Recently, the US president attacked lawmakers on Twitter over the weekend, saying they should not tell Americans how to run the country. The women were not named but are largely believed to be Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna...

sputniknews.com

15.07.2019

 

[angelburst29]

Missing American scientist found dead in Crete
ATHENS July 9, 2019 - An American scientist who disappeared a week ago on the island of Crete was found dead on Tuesday, her employers said.

Suzanne Eaton, 60, a molecular biologist at the world-renowned Max Planck Institute in Dresden, Germany, was attending a conference in the town of Chania when she was reported missing on July 2.

Suspect confesses in murder of U.S. scientist, Greek police say

Crete's Chief of Police Konstantinos Lagoudakis (C), Chania Police Chief Giorgos Libinakis (R) and Director of Security for Chania Police Paris Chinopoulos are seen during a news conference, presenting the latest developments on the murder of American biologist Suzanne Eaton, in Chania, on the island of Crete, Greece July 16, 2019. REUTERS/Makis Kartsonakis

July 16, 2019 - ATHENS - Greek police believe they have found the killer of an American biologist who was found murdered on the island of Crete on July 8, a source said on Tuesday.



Suzanne Eaton, 60, a molecular biologist at the Max Planck Institute in Dresden, Germany, was found dead in a disused military bunker on July 8, a week after she went missing. A 27-year-old man questioned in connection with her death confessed to the crime, said Constantinos Lagoudakis, a senior police official in the Cretan town of Chania.

“During the questioning he confessed his act and will be taken to court today,” he said in a televised statement. In accordance with Greek law, the suspect was not identified by name.

The suspect confessed to knocking Eaton down twice with his car, then killing her, a spokesperson said. He is expected to appear before a prosecutor later on Tuesday to respond to the accusations.

Eaton had been on the island for a science conference. She was thought to be out jogging on the day she disappeared and colleagues raised the alarm when she failed to return.

Her body was found by cavers in the bunker, a system of manmade caves used by the Nazis during the occupation of Crete in World War Two. A post-mortem last week concluded that she died of asphyxiation.

Police said they had evidence Eaton had been killed elsewhere, then taken to the cave where her body was dumped through an air shaft. Marks of sexual abuse were found on her body, Lagoudakis said.

Trial begins with high stakes for U.S.-Turkey ties, ex-Trump adviser Flynn

In a court case that could further strain American relations with Turkey and weigh on the sentencing of former U.S. national security adviser Michael Flynn, a criminal trail began on Monday involving a former Iranian-American business partner of Flynn.

Bijan Rafiekain's trail in the US District Court in Alexandria, Virginia, turns on whether he conspired to lobby on Turkey's behalf to try to persuade the US government to extradite Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed by Turkey for a failed coup in July 2016.

“During the summer and fall of 2016, the defendant has acted as an agent to advance one of Turkey’s most important foreign policy goals,” one U.S. prosecutor said in his opening statement, adding that was to help support Ankara’s goal in seeking the extradition of Gulen from the United States.

Flynn, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant general whose brief tenure in 2017 as part of President Donald Trump’s inner circle is still causing legal aftershocks, is not charged as a co-conspirator with Rafiekian. But the case could influence how U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan sentences Flynn later this year in Washington.

Flynn had previously agreed to cooperate with U.S. prosecutors and testify against Rafiekian, known as “Kian,” in hopes of getting a lighter sentence after he pleaded guilty in December 2017 to having lied to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators about his contacts with Russian officials.

In a reversal earlier this month, Flynn and prosecutors had a falling out and Flynn backed away from earlier admissions of making false statements to the U.S. Justice Department in paperwork that disclosed his work as a Turkish government lobbyist.

Flynn now contends he relied on attorneys’ advice when filing the lobbying paperwork with the Justice Department and that he did not knowingly file false information.

Strained Ties
Rafiekian faces two criminal counts of conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government, making false statements to the Justice Department and acting as a foreign agent. His former client, Turkish-Dutch national Ekim Alptekin, is also charged.

The trial, which began on the third anniversary of Turkey’s failed coup that killed 251 people and wounded more than 1,500, has implications for already strained ties between Ankara and Washington.

US prosecutors are aiming to build a case showing Rafiekian and Alptekin acted with direction from the Turkish government and did not disclose their lobbying campaign to return Gulen, a shadowy figure who lives in a fortified compound in Pennsylvania, to Turkey.

The Turkish government has denied engaging in a conspiracy to evade U.S. regulations requiring foreign government lobbyists to register with the Justice Department.

“The idea that we would conspire against the United States is preposterous. ... We categorically reject any accusation of wrongdoing or illegal conduct in the United States,” Fahrettin Altun, spokesman for the Turkish presidency, said in a statement over the weekend.

Lawyers for Rafiekian denied the allegations. “Bijan never conspired with anyone, never ever sought to avoid U.S. regulations, never conspired to serve as an agent of a foreign government,” his attorney, Bob Trout, said in his opening statements.

Government lawyers now no longer plan to call Flynn as a star witness in the Rafiekian case, although they may end up calling Flynn’s son, Michael G. Flynn, who worked for Flynn’s lobbying firm, known as the Flynn Intel Group. Defense lawyers for Rafiekian have listed the elder Flynn as a possible star witness in the case.

The U.S. government is expected to call five witnesses on Tuesday, prosecutors said. Michael G. Flynn was not one of them.

Flynn was due to be sentenced in December 2018, but his sentence was delayed after Judge Sullivan lambasted him for selling his country out to Russia and urged him to complete his cooperation with government prosecutors.

Trump to Kim ...


Move over Trump: China's tweeting diplomats open fresh front in propaganda fight

FILE PHOTO: China's ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai responds to reporters questions during an interview with Reuters in Washington, U.S., November 6, 2018. REUTERS/Jim Bourg/File Photo

Cui sent his first tweets just last week from his newly opened Twitter account, including one about Taiwan, the self-ruled and democratic island China claims as its own, garnering thousands of comments.

“#Taiwan is part of #China. No attempts to split China will ever succeed. Those who play with fire will only get themselves burned. Period,” Cui tweeted, after China threatened sanctions on U.S. firms selling weapons to Taiwan.

And over the weekend, a series of tweets defending China’s policies in the far western region of Xinjiang by diplomat Zhao Lijian, the no.2 at the Chinese embassy in Pakistan, lambasted the United States for its own human rights problems and what he described as hypocrisy.

The recent spate of 240-character missives, a regular channel of communication with U.S. President Donald Trump in his criticism of China, fit a newer, more aggressive type of diplomacy that Beijing is deploying globally, analysts say.

Yuan Zeng, a lecturer in Media and Communications at the University of Leeds, said the Diplomat tweets were part of a clear shift in China's strategy. "For individual officials to get so openly expressive and assertive, this is really something new", she said.

Twitter is blocked in China and the diplomats’ messages were in English and aimed at a foreign audience.

Chinese news outlets, including the ruling Communist Party’s leading propaganda organs, the People’s Daily and Xinhua, have also targeted readers outside China’s so-called “Great Firewall”.

Zhao’s tweets were responding to a letter 22 countries signed at the U.N. Human Rights Council last week calling on China to halt detentions in Xinjiang.

He criticized the United States for its poor treatment of Muslims in places like Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay, where al Qaeda fighters are held. He also tweeted a link to a Washington Post story about racial segregation in the capital and then proceeded to write a string of tweets about U.S. gun violence, hate crimes and violence against women.

“If you’re in Washington, D.C., you know the white never go to the SW area, because it’s an area for the black & Latin. There’s a saying ‘black in & white out’, which means that as long as a black family enters, white people will quit, & price of the apartment will fall sharply,” he tweeted in English. He then corrected himself, saying it was the southeast area.

The tweets put China’s diplomatic aggressiveness on full display and reach a larger audience than more conventional media might, but they also may come with a cost, Zeng said.

“I have doubts on how effective it could be to create a better international environment for China either to grow or to lead, as the government has been saying, to peacefully engage with the world,” she added.

Responding to Zhao on Twitter, Susan Rice, who served as National Security Adviser and U.S. ambassador to the U.N. during the Obama administration, labeled the diplomat “a racist disgrace” who was “shockingly ignorant”, and called on Cui to make sure Zhao was removed.

Zhao returned fire on Monday - and noted pointedly that he was based in Islamabad, not Washington, where Cui is ambassador.

“To label someone who speak(s) the truth that you don’t want to hear a racist, is disgraceful & disgusting,” he wrote.

China and the United States have long sparred over human rights, and in recent years China has produced its own annual rights report on the situation in the United States, focusing on areas including racism and gun crime.

Cui’s Taiwan tweet received over 2,000 comments, most of which were negative and many of which offered support for Taiwan, potentially highlighting a risk of expanding the propaganda battlefield.

A recent paper in the International Journal of Communication analyzed tweets from official Chinese diplomatic accounts from 2014 to 2018 and found that engagement with platforms that are blocked in a China helps extend the reach of “the invisible hand of censorship”.

China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman, Hua Chunying, encouraged officials to “clearly express China’s position and attitude”, to join foreign social media platforms and look for ways to cooperate in a deeper way with media.

“We are closer than ever to the center of the world stage,” she wrote last week in the Study Times, a publication of the Central Party School which trains Chinese officials. “But we do not have a full grasp of the microphone.”

Guatemalan court halts 'safe third country' designation for asylum seekers

Guatemala's Constitutional Court has blocked President Jimmy Morales from immediately declaring the poor Central American nation a safe third country for asylum-seekers, amid growing pushback to U.S. pressure that it absorb large numbers of migrants.

 

[Ca.]

This evening's lead page from Zionist News TV media. While the recent quakes are truly the most significant.
Plus a bay area body count and crime wave continue with no end.



Meanwhile:

https://twitter.com/latimes/status/1151216195170897921

 

[aragorn]

It may not be more than a fantasy and ‘wishful thinking’, but I see some sources saying how Trump’s recent ‘racist tweets’ targeting ‘The Squad’ was a calculated move to polarize the Dems even more. The theory goes, that by condemning his tweets the Dems, not least Pelosi, were forced to side with The Squad (AOC and the three others). And as these four are appearing for many Americans as crazy persons, and they are not doing too good in recent pollings, that will make the whole Dem leadership loose even more popularity, and boost Trump’s camp. The fact that a Democrat chairman banned Pelosi from continuing speaking in the recent House session tells you that the Dems are pretty polarized.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1151271632306151429

 

[SummerLite]

Dems relinquish control to the "squad" (?) this is beyond words, saying the whole show is insane doesn't do it justice. Its all so grotesque. What is going on with these people? Psychological profiles please. I'm reading Political Ponerology now which sheds a bit of light but I've only just started. AOC seems like a compulsive liar. Its good to see these 4 aren't appreciated with the majority, thank god.

AOC photo op with empty parking lot.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez refused to condemn an Antifa terrorist attack on an ICE facility despite the terrorist invoking her “concentration camp” rhetoric in his own manifesto. AOC Refuses to Condemn Antifa Terror Attack on ICE Facility (videos within article)

69-year-old Willem Van Spronsen was shot dead by police on Saturday morning (7/13/19) at an ICE facility in Washington State after he threw molotov cocktails in an attempt to ignite a propane tank. He was also armed with an AR-15 semi-automatic weapon.

Van Spronsen was subsequently celebrated by some on the far-left and a copy of his manifesto emerged in which he stated, “I am Antifa” and said the attack was a protest against the establishment of “concentration camps” in the United States.

When asked by a Rebel Media reporter earlier today whether she would condemn the attack, AOC refused to explicitly condemn it, saying only that she would make a statement about the incident later.
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Rep. IIhan Omar also refused to comment on the attack when asked the same question. Later AOC said she condemned it but it looks bad they couldn't give a simple "yes" when asked. Maybe to much being read into the whole thing BUT for the fact ANTIFA is being given a free pass by law enforcement and has been touted as the good guys on such propaganda networks as CNN.

It’s easy to condemn a terrorist attack,” responded the reporter.

“They firebombed an American facility, will you condemn them?” pressed the reporter.

He then asked AOC if she felt any “responsibility” for the attack given that the terrorist invoked her “concentration camp” claim in his manifesto.

“Are you responsible? Do you feel ashamed?” asked the reporter, as AOC walked away.

As we reported earlier, CNN also refused to comment after it was revealed that Van Spronsen had appeared in one of their broadcasts during which the group he was a member of was described as the “good guys”.

In a subsequent exchange, Rep. Ilhan Omar also refused to condemn the attack.