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rominent Republican donor Sheldon Adelson on Thursday said he would support Donald Trump for the US presidency. Get The Times

rominent Republican donor Sheldon Adelson on Thursday said he would support Donald Trump for the US presidency

“Yes. I’m a Republican, he’s a Republican,” Adelson said at a Manhattan event when asked if he would back Trump, according to The New York Times. “He’s our nominee. Whoever the nominee would turn out to be, any one of the 17 — he was one of the 17. He won fair and square.” The Jewish billionaire, and owner of the pro-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu daily Israel Hayom, said he believes Trump “will be good for Israel,” and noted, without elaborating, that the two spoke recently. Adelson donated tens of millions of dollars to Mitt Romney and organizations supporting the Republican challenger in the last election, and was by far the largest such donor. Adelson had previously declared Trump to be “very charming” after meeting him in December, but stopped short of endorsing him or supporting his campaign. Trump has prided himself in his campaign speeches on not needing the support of mega-donors like Adelson, whom other candidates, at the time, were assiduously courting. In October, Trump tweeted “Sheldon Adelson is looking to give big dollars to Rubio because he feels he can mold him into his perfect little puppet. I agree!”

The United States government has already declared that in regards to what it alleges to be a Russian cyberattack against the U.S. Democratic Party, the U.S. reserves the right to go to war against Russia. NATO has accordingly changed its policy so as to assert that a cyberattack (in this case actually cyber-espionage, such as the U.S. government itself perpetrates against even its own allies such as Angela Merkel by tapping her phone) constitutes an act of war by the alleged cyberattacker, and so requires all NATO member nations to join any cyberattacked NATO nation in war against its alleged (cyber)attacker, if the cyberattacked member declares war against its alleged cyberattacker. Excuses are being sought for a war against Russia; and expanding the definition of “invasion,” to include mere espionage, is one such excuse. But it’s not the only one that the Obama Administration has cooked up. U.S. Senator Mike Lee has asserted that President Barack Obama must obtain a declaration of war against Syria — which is allied with and defended by Russia — before invading Syria. Syria has, for the past few years, already been invaded by tens of thousands of foreign jihadists (financed mainly by the royal Sauds and Qataris, and armed mainly with U.S. weaponry) who are trying to overthrow and replace the Syrian government so that pipelines can be built through Syria into Europe to transport Saudi oil and Qatari gas into the EU, the world’s biggest energy-market, which now is dominated by Russia’s oil and gas. Since Syria is already being defended by Russia (those royals’ major competitor in the oil and gas markets), America’s invasion of Syria would necessarily place U.S. and Russia into an air-war against each other (for the benefit of those royal Arabs — who finance jihadist groups, as even Hillary Clinton acknowledges): Syria would thus become a battleground in a broader war against Russia. So: declaring war against Syria would be a second excuse for World War III, and one which would especially serve the desires not only of U.S. ‘defense’ firms but of the U.S. aristocracy’s royal Arabic allies, who buy much of those ‘defense’ firms’ exports (weaponry), and also U.S. oilfield services firms such as pipelines by Halliburton. (It’s good business for them, no one else. Taxpayers and war-victims pay, but those corporations — and royal families — would profit.)

The U.S. government also declares that Russia ‘conquered’ Crimea in 2014 and that Russia must restore it to Ukraine. The U.S. government wants Ukraine to be accepted into NATO, so that all NATO nations will be at war against Russia if Russia doesn’t return Crimea to Ukraine, of which Crimea had only briefly (1954-2014) been a part, until Crimeans voted on 16 March 2014 to rejoin Russia. This Crimean issue is already the basis for America’s economic sanctions against Russia, and thus Russia’s continuing refusal to coerce Crimeans to accept again being part of Ukraine would be yet a third excuse for WW III.

Hillary Clinton says “As President, I will make it clear, that the United States will treat cyber attacks just like any other attack.” She alleges that when information was unauthorizedly made public from Democratic National Committee computers, the cyberattacker was Russia. She can be counted as a strong proponent of that excuse for WW3. She’s with Barack Obama and the other neocons on that. She has furthermore said that the U.S. should shoot down any Russian and Syrian bombers in Syria — the phrase for that proposed U.S. policy is to “establish a no-fly zone” there. She makes clear: “I am advocating the no-fly zone.” It would be war against not only Syria, but Russia. (After all: a no-fly zone in which the U.S. is shooting down the government’s planes and Russia’s planes, would be war by the U.S. against both Syria and Russia, but that’s what she wants to do.) She can thus be counted as a strong proponent of those two excuses for WW3.

Donald Trump endorsed an unabashedly noninterventionist approach to world affairs Monday during a day-long tour of Washington, casting doubt on the need for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and expressing skepticism about a muscular U.S. military presence in Asia. The foreign policy positions — outlined in a meeting with the editorial board of The Washington Post — came on a day when Trump set aside the guerrilla tactics and showman bravado that have powered his campaign to appear as a would-be presidential nominee, explaining his policies, accepting counsel and building bridges to Republican elites.

During the hour-long discussion, during which he revealed five of his foreign policy advisers, Trump advocated a light footprint in the world. In spite of unrest in the Middle East and elsewhere, he said, the United States must look inward and steer its resources toward rebuilding the nation’s crumbling infrastructure.

“At what point do you say, ‘Hey, we have to take care of ourselves?’ ” Trump said in the editorial board meeting. “I know the outer world exists, and I’ll be very cognizant of that. But at the same time, our country is disintegrating, large sections of it, especially the inner cities.” Trump said U.S. involvement in NATO may need to be significantly diminished in the coming years, breaking with nearly seven decades of consensus in Washington. “We certainly can’t afford to do this anymore,” he said, adding later, “NATO is costing us a fortune, and yes, we’re protecting Europe with NATO, but we’re spending a lot of money.”

Prominent neocon Robert Kagan has endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president, saying she represents the best hope for saving the United States from populist billionaire Donald Trump, who has repudiated the neoconservative cause of U.S. military interventions in line with Israel’s interests. In a Washington Post op-ed published on Thursday, Kagan excoriated the Republican Party for creating the conditions for Trump’s rise and then asked, “So what to do now? The Republicans’ creation will soon be let loose on the land, leaving to others the job the party failed to carry out.” Then referring to himself, he added, “For this former Republican, and perhaps for others, the only choice will be to vote for Hillary Clinton. The [Republican] party cannot be saved, but the country still can be.”

While many of Kagan’s observations about the Republican tolerance – and even encouragement – of bigotry are correct, the fact that a leading neocon, a co-founder of the infamous Project for the New American Century, has endorsed Clinton raises questions for Democrats who have so far given the former New York senator and Secretary of State mostly a pass on her pro-interventionist policies. The fact is that Clinton has generally marched in lock step with the neocons as they have implemented an aggressive “regime change” strategy against governments and political movements that don’t toe Washington’s line or that deviate from Israel’s goals in the Middle East. So she has backed coups, such as in Honduras (2009) and Ukraine (2014); invasions, such as Iraq (2003) and Libya (2011); and subversions such as Syria (from 2011 to the present) – all with various degrees of disastrous results.

This is delicious. Donald Trump’s anti-interventionist foreign policy ideas are causing panic among the neoconservatives. Clearly this branch of the Republican establishment will leave the party over Trump. Neoconservative Washington Post writer Jennifer Rubin is outraged that Chris Christie would endorse Donald Trump despite “months and months of careful coaching” in foreign policy by “outside… experts.” That’s how the Israel lobby works, by coaching politicians. This is what the neocons have successfully done with Marco Rubio: gotten him to be a robot on the Israel issue.

And then this. Neoconservative Robert Kagan, also in the Washington Post, is endorsing Hillary Clinton because of Trump’s xenophobia and demagoguery and racism, but also the foreign policy

Kagan is the man who brought us the Project for New American Century letters that helped get the country into the Iraq War.

The Kremlin may have covered up the murder of a former KGB chief accused of helping ex-MI6 spy Christopher Steele to pull together the notorious dossier on Donald Trump.Oleg Erovinkin served as a general in the KGB and was found dead on Boxing Day in the back of his car in Moscow.It has been claimed he died of a heart attack, but an expert on Russian security threats believes he was murdered for his role in the explosive dossier.  The suspected murder victim was close to former deputy prime minister Igor Sechin, who is named throughout the leaked memo, according to the Telegraph.Erovinkin is understood to have been an important link between Sechin and leader of the Kremlin Vladimir Putin.Agent Steele's dossier, which was made public earlier this month, noted how he had a source close to Sechin.

He said the source had revealed alleged links between the US President's supporters and Moscow. At the time of Erovinkin's death, Russian state-run RIA Novosti news agency said his body was found in a black Lexus and that a major investigation was underway in the area. His body was sent to the morgue, which returned no cause of death, and the investigation continues. Local media reports suggested he was killed as a result of foul play, but it was later claimed he died of a heart attack. Christo Grozev, an expert on Russia-related security threats, wrote in a blog post, that he believes Erovinkin was Mr Steele's dossier source. He wrote that he has no doubt the dossier was on Putin's desk at the time the suspected victim died. 'Whichever is true,' he wrote, 'He would have had a motive to seek – and find the mole.

'He would have had to conclude that Erovinkin was at least a person of interest.' The so-called dirty dossier states that in 2013 Trump hired prostitutes to urinate on the bed of the Presidential Suite at the Moscow Ritz Carlton, where he knew Barack and Michelle Obama had previously stayed.It says: 'Trump's unorthodox behavior in Russia over the years had provided the authorities there with enough embarrassing material on the now Republican presidential candidate to be able to blackmail him if they so wished.'The document states that Trump had declined 'sweetener' real estate deals in Russia that the Kremlin lined up in order to cultivate him.The business proposals were said to be 'in relation to the ongoing 2018 World Cup soccer tournament'The dossier claimed that the Russian regime had been 'cultivating, supporting and assisting Trump for at least five years'.According to the document, one source even claimed that 'the Trump operation was both supported and directed by Russian President Vladimir Putin' with the aim being to 'sow discord'.The report claims that Russian President Vladimir Putin himself had endorsed moves to encourage 'splits and divisions in the West.The dossier was handed over to the FBI in August although the information was also passed from the former MI6 agent to John McCain through an intermediary.McCain then handed the document over to FBI Director James Comey.

An ex-spy chief who spoke out publicly against Trump while inspiring other career intelligence figures to follow suit has admitted his leading role in the intelligence community waging political war against the president, describing his actions as something he didn't "fully think through". In a surprisingly frank interview, the CIA's Michael Morell - who was longtime Deputy Director and former Acting Director of the nation's most powerful intelligence agency - said that it wasn't a great idea to leak against and bash a new president. Morell had the dubious distinction of being George W. Bush's personal daily briefer for the agency before and after 9/11, and also served under Obama until his retirement. In the summer of 2016 he took the unusual step (for a former intelligence chief) of openly endorsing Hillary Clinton in a New York Times op-ed entitled, I Ran the C.I.A. Now I'm Endorsing Hillary Clinton, after which he continued to be both an outspoken critic of Trump and an early CIA voice promoting the Russian collusion and election meddling narrative.

Perhaps you’ve noticed. Some people and institutions are working feverishly to convince us that real social change is not possible. Their target is Bernie Sanders and the growing army of his supporters who are fed up with politics as usual and the grip of Wall Street and corporate America on our political, economic and social system. The theme is to desperately convince us that Sanders can’t win. They repeat it over and over, even though Sanders polls as well or better than Hillary Clinton does against every leading Republican candidate. Behind this effort is an alarmed corporate old guard that still runs the Democratic Party establishment and their allies in the corporate think tanks and the media, with a special nod to NBC/MSNBC, which is owned and operated by General Electric and Comcast.

In this scenario to blunt the Sanders’ surge, and what it represents for the millions of people who want to reverse income inequality, guarantee health care to everyone, break up the banks, carry out meaningful environmental justice and criminal justice reform, and all the other far reaching planks of Sanders’ campaign and the coalition supporting it. A thrust of their effort is to persuade Sanders supporters that he cannot win, in large part by using all the well-funded mechanisms in their control to retard wider exposure to the message of Sanders and his allies. The power elite form of turning down the gaslights. Here’s a small part of how the manipulation works. 

The Democratic National Committee slashes the number of debates and schedules debates on Saturday nights when far fewer people are watching, and pressures its elected officials and convention super delegates for an early endorsement in an effort to lock down a coronation of their preferred candidate. Meanwhile the media, in particular NBC/MSNBC which has the biggest network audience of presumed Democratic Party voters, limits coverage of Sanders while it’s parent company, GE, also directs its Hollywood subsidiaries, including Universal Studios (co-owned by Comcast) and its NBC shows, to line up its contracted celebrities to endorse the politics as usual campaign. Other national media, which also has a stake in the status quo, contributes as well. While Sanders has now drawn more than 400,000 people to his rallies – far more than any other candidate – he routinely receives less coverage than most of the other leading candidates. A report, circulated by Media Matters, found that on one network alone Donald Trump has been given 81 minutes of coverage compared to less than one minute for Sanders, even though, as The Nation’s John Nichols notes, Sanders has broader support among Democratic voters than Trump does among Republicans in the first voting state, Iowa.

Donald Trump has claimed he will sign an executive order mandating the death penalty for all convicted cop killers, as a petition to deny him entry to the UK becomes the most signed on parliament’s website. It follows a week of controversial rhetoric from the Republican presidential hopeful. On Monday, the billionaire claimed as president he would order a “complete shutdown” of all Muslim immigration to the US, sparking a week-long row that has dominated media coverage and seen Trump recover in the polls, having fallen behind Ted Cruz in an earlier Monmouth poll.

Accepting the endorsement of the New England Police Benevolent Association, a local police union representing more than 4,000 officials, Trump issued his latest legally-murky commandment on Thursday night.

"One of the first things I do, in terms of executive order if I win, will be to sign a strong, strong statement that will go out to the country -- out to the world -- that anybody killing a policeman, policewoman, a police officer -- anybody killing a police officer, the death penalty. It's going to happen, OK?"

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey endorsed Donald J. Trump on Friday, a major turn in a wild race and one that gives the New York businessman a major boost as he heads into the pivotal “Super Tuesday” contests.

Task force will help Clinton supporters push back on online harassment and thank superdelegates Anonymous online attacks, from both sides of the political spectrum, have sought to spread lies and misleading narratives about Secretary Hillary Clinton. Hillary’s supporters are more enthusiastic than Sen. Bernie Sanders’ supporters, yet oftentimes are discouraged from engaging online and are “often afraid to voice their thoughts” because of the fear of online harassment. Many of Hillary Clinton’s female supporters in particular have been subject to intense cyber-bullying and sexist attacks from swarms of anonymous attackers. Among the many Hillary Clinton supporters attacked online, superdelegates have been subject to vicious attacks for supporting her. Even the director of MoveOn, which has endorsed Sen. Sanders, denounced this harassment. In response to these attacks on supporters and superdelegates, Correct The Record is launching the Barrier Breakers 2016 digital task force. While Hillary Clinton fights to break down barriers and bring America together, the Barrier Breakers 2016 digital task force will serve as a resource for supporters looking for positive content and push-back to share with their online progressive communities, as well as thanking prominent supporters and committed superdelegates on social media.

ask force will help Clinton supporters push back on online harassment and thank superdelegates Anonymous online attacks, from both sides of the political spectrum, have sought to spread lies and misleading narratives about Secretary Hillary Clinton. Hillary’s supporters are more enthusiastic than Sen. Bernie Sanders’ supporters, yet oftentimes are discouraged from engaging online and are “often afraid to voice their thoughts” because of the fear of online harassment. Many of Hillary Clinton’s female supporters in particular have been subject to intense cyber-bullying and sexist attacks from swarms of anonymous attackers. Among the many Hillary Clinton supporters attacked online, superdelegates have been subject to vicious attacks for supporting her. Even the director of MoveOn, which has endorsed Sen. Sanders, denounced this harassment. In response to these attacks on supporters and superdelegates, Correct The Record is launching the Barrier Breakers 2016 digital task force. While Hillary Clinton fights to break down barriers and bring America together, the Barrier Breakers 2016 digital task force will serve as a resource for supporters looking for positive content and push-back to share with their online progressive communities, as well as thanking prominent supporters and committed superdelegates on social media.

Correct The Record will invest more than $1 million into Barrier Breakers 2016 activities, including the more than tripling of its digital operation to engage in online messaging both for Secretary Clinton and to push back against attackers on social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, and Instagram. Barrier Breakers 2016 is a project of Correct The Record and the brainchild of David Brock, and the task force will be overseen by President of Correct The Record Brad Woodhouse and Digital Director Benjamin Fischbein. The task force staff’s backgrounds are as diverse as the community they will be engaging with and include former reporters, bloggers, public affairs specialists, designers, Ready for Hillary alumni, and Hillary super fans who have led groups similar to those with which the task force will organize. Lessons learned from online engagement with “Bernie Bros” during the Democratic Primary will be applied to the rest of the primary season and general election–responding quickly and forcefully to negative attacks and false narratives. Additionally, as the general election approaches, the task force will begin to push out information to Sanders supporters online, encouraging them to support Hillary Clinton. The task force currently combats online political harassment, having already addressed more than 5,000 individuals who have personally attacked Secretary Clinton on Twitter. The task force will provide a presence and space online where Clinton supporters can organize and engage with one another and are able to obtain graphics, videos, gifs, and messaging to use in their own social spaces. Additionally, the Barrier Breakers 2016 task force hopes to embrace the creativity of Hillary Clinton’s supporters by sharing their efforts and content with other groups.

Washington's support for a new Palestinian government backed by Israel's Islamist foe Hamas, has left the Jewish state feeling betrayed, triggering a new crisis with its closest ally. Several Israeli ministers expressed public anger on Tuesday after the US State Department said it was willing to work with the new Palestinian unity government put together by the West Bank leadership and Gaza's Hamas rulers. Technocratic in nature, the new government was sworn in on Monday in front of president Mahmud Abbas, with Washington offering its backing several hours later.

Speaking to reporters on Monday, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the new cabinet would be judged "by its actions.""At this point, it appears that president Abbas has formed an interim technocratic government that does not include ministers affiliated with Hamas," she said. "With what we know now, we will work with this government."

The US endorsement was viewed as a major blow for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had on Sunday urged the international community not to rush into recognising the new government, which he said would only "strengthen terror."

Washington also has a history of targeting countries that are sitting on strategic resources or transport routes, or which attempt to mount any form of economic resistance. Trump has openly endorsed this practice by the way (which is a break from the typical propaganda cover that is usually employed).

Were you aware that it was recently discovered that North Korea is sitting on the worlds largest deposit of rare earth metals? In fact their deposit is twice as large as the world’s total known reserves prior to this discovery. This is find is estimated to be worth trillions of dollars (that’s trillions with a T). Rare earth metals are essential in the manufacture of modern electronics, which makes it a matter of strategic importance, and China currently has a monopoly on global production. In the context of an escalation in the South China or the East China seas, this would be a significant vulnerability for the west.