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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
11/12/2015 4:23:02 PM
70 years after providing key technology to Adolf Hitler's Third Reich, IBM is now lending computing power to U.S. drone strikes that kill civilians

Thursday, November 12, 2015 by: J. D. Heyes




(NaturalNews) More than seven decades after the defeat of Adolf Hitler's Nazi-inspired Third Reich on battlefields that left much of Europe in shambles, U.S. technology giant IBM – which played a major role in all phases of the Holocaust – is once again in the business of killing.

As reported by investigative news site The Intercept, a secret brief discussing the Pentagon's drone strike program in Somalia and Yemen dated February 2013 was produced for the Defense Department by IBM analysts.

"On its surface, it's simply an analysis by the Defense Department's Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) Task Force of the 'performance and requirements' of the U.S. military's counterterrorism kill/capture operations, including drone strikes, in Somalia and Yemen," The Intercept reported. "However, it's also what a former senior special operations officer characterized as a '***** brief' – that is, a study designed to be a weapon in a bureaucratic turf war with the CIA to win the Pentagon more money and a bigger mandate."

It's a safe bet to assume that the study outlined in the brief was an opportunity for IBM to show that it is capable of producing quality analyses specific to the Defense Department as well as for current Pentagon employees to network with a potential future employer.

Building target packages like a corporation tracks customers

However, experts say there is more to the presentation. For one, it's a rare glimpse into the inner workings of the military-industrial complex, where assassination technologies and corporate sales merge, shrouded in lifeless language as dead as the target of a "kinetic engagement."

The IBM-Defense Department drone strike analysis relationship likely began in earnest in 2010, when IBM employees delivered a talk at the tech giant's Analytics Solution Center in Washington, D.C. Titled "An Introduction to Edge Methods: Business Analytics and Optimization for Intelligence," the intended audience was "Defense and Intelligence communities." The company's goal was to demonstrate how IBMcould assist with "managing large volumes of data" to derive "invaluable" insights. The company already had an existing governmental customer: the ISR Task Force

The Intercept further noted:

Although buried in reams of corporate management gobbledygook (IBM, it turns out, is "Mission Focused" and "Performance Driven"), the talk's key theme was that IBM was offering prospective new government clients its "expertise in integrating business and technology services" using its "commercial consulting methods." That is, IBM was bringing what it had learned from managing Big Data for corporate America to the military and intelligence worlds.

Some things never change

As is evident in the secret brief, the Pentagon's drone program is utilizing data analytics in nearly the exact same way that IBM encourages corporations to track customers. The only difference, of course, is that at the end of the drone process, the "customer" is killed.

The Pentagon's drone infrastructure employs Big Data to "build target packages" for high-value individuals. Drones try "to maintain 24/7 persistent stare," like corporations need "to get a 360 view of the customer."

After he retired from the Army, Gen. Stanley McChrystal made a sobering statement about the U.S. drone strike program: "...[A]lthough to the United States, a drone strike seems to have very little risk and very little pain, at the receiving end, it feels like war. Americans have got to understand that. If we were to use our technological capabilities carelessly – I don't think we do, but there's always the danger that you will – then we should not be upset when someone responds with their equivalent, which is a suicide bomb in Central Park, because that's what they can respond with."

As for the Nazis and IBM, The Huffington Post reported in July 2012 that newly released (at the time) documents showed the company played a "pivotal role" in the Holocaust in "all six phases: identification, expulsion from society, confiscation, ghettoization, deportation, and even extermination." In fact, the company's president at the time, Thomas J. Watson, was personally involved.

Some horrific things never change, it appears.

The full Intercept report is here.


Sources include:






"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
11/12/2015 4:31:18 PM
Quenelle - Golden

Russian FM slams NATO's role in Syrian crisis, sets record straight about Russia 'challenging world order'

© Sputnik/ Evgenya Novozhenina
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova commented on the preparations for the upcoming Vienna talks on the Syrian settlement and explained Russia's actions aimed at strengthening its military capabilities.


ISIL Has Access to Chemical Weapons

Maria Zakharova said that Nusra Front and ISIL terrorists continued to receive large batches of weapons and ammunition from unknown donors.

"We note that ISIL and Nusra Front militants still receive large batches of arms and ammunition... As we can see, the issue concerning these groups' sources of supply, constantly raised by Russia, remains open."


Answering a question on Saudi Arabia's arms supplies to so-called moderate rebels in Syria, Maria Zakharova said that it was illegal to provide arms to non-governmental organizations.

ISIL and other radical groups have access to chemical weapons in the Middle East, Zakharova said.

"According to numerous reports, ISIL and some other radical Islamist groups, which are prohibited in Russia, have got access to components and technology for the production of chemical weapons in the Middle East... and have begun to use them more actively in Syria and Iraq."

Vienna Talks on Syrian Settlement

Washington's initiative on the creation of working groups on the Syrian settlement on November 12-13 has become a surprise for Moscow, she said, adding that the US did not discuss the issue with Russia.

"No one had discussed this with us earlier, we're saying that we weren't contacted in regard to this issue, we didn't discuss preliminary plans on the topics of the groups, the time, the venue, not even the level or character of the representatives or the character of the participants."

Representatives of Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and the European Union were not invited to the working groups on the Syrian reconciliation, Zakharova said.

"We consider the United States' actions in forming working groups to be an unsuccessful experiment," Zakharova said.

The Russian Foreign Ministry accused Reuters of publishing a fake report on Moscow's alleged proposals on the Syrian crisis settlement.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will participate in the Syrian talks in Vienna slated for November 14, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday.

The spokeswoman also praised the United Nations' role in the Syrian reconciliation.

Moscow Strikes Back at Carter Over Accusations of Sabre-Rattling

The Russian Foreign Ministry's spokeswoman said that US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter's claims of Russia's alleged sabre-rattling were "far from reality."

Earlier this week, Ashton Carter accused Russia of "challenging the world order."

"Recently, US Secretary of Defense Carter accused Russia of saber-rattling and undermining global stability. These statements are far from reality. We categorically reject such accusations against us."

Russia strengthens its defense capabilities due to US' actions, including the deployment of missile defense systems to Europe, Zakharova said.

"What Russia is doing in the sphere of strengthening its defense capabilities is largely due to US actions, including the development of the American nuclear arsenal, the deployment of the global missile defense system allegedly aimed at achieving strategic parity, and the movement of NATO infrastructure toward Russia's borders. We certainly cannot remain indifferent or ignore attempts to weaken our security," she added.

On Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that references to the threats allegedly posed by the Iranian and North Korea nuclear programs conceal true Washington's intentions to achieve military superiority, adding that Moscow would take appropriate measures to strengthen the capacity of its strategic nuclear forces and to build its own missile defense network in response to US plans to build global missile defenses.

Russia has repeatedly expressed concern over the creation of a US-designed ballistic missile defense system in Europe approved during a NATO summit in 2010. A group of European countries, including Poland, Romania, Spain and Turkey, agreed to deploy elements of the system on their soil.

Comment: Whether it's knocking out NATO propaganda or NATO's terrorist proxies, Russia continues to deliver. No wonder Carter is fuming that Russia has 'challenged the world order'. What a whiny bunch of lies. What has Russia done? Russia has challenged the state of absolute anarchy where NATO bombs countries into oblivion and then turns them into terrorist breeding grounds:

"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
11/12/2015 4:40:31 PM

4 Harbingers Of Stock Market Doom That Foreshadowed The 2008 Crash Are Flashing Red Again



So many of the exact same patterns that we witnessed just before the stock market crash of 2008 are playing out once again right before our eyes. Most of the time, a stock market crash doesn’t just come out of nowhere. Normally there are specific leading indicators that we can look for that will tell us if major trouble is on the horizon. One of these leading indicators is the junk bond market. Right now, a closely watched high yield bond ETF known as JNK is sitting at 35.77. If it falls below 35, that will be a major red flag, and it will be the first time that it has done so since 2009. As you can see from this chart, JNK started crashing in June and July of 2008 – well before equities started crashing later that year. A crash in junk bonds almost always precedes a major crash in stocks, and so this is something that I am watching carefully.

And there is a reason why junk bonds are crashing. In 2015 we have seen the most corporate bond downgrades since the last financial crisis, and corporate debt defaults are absolutely skyrocketing. The following comes from a recent piece by Porter Stansberry

So far this year, nearly 300 U.S. corporations have seen their bonds downgraded. That’s the most downgrades per year since the financial crisis of 2008-2009. The year isn’t over yet. Neither are the downgrades. More worrisome, the 12-month default rate on high-yield corporate debt has doubled this year. This suggests we are well into the next major debt-default cycle.

Another thing that I am watching closely is the price of oil.

A massive crash in the price of oil preceded the stock market crash of 2008, and over the past year we have seen another dramatic crash in the price of oil.

Many had been expecting the price of oil to bounce back, but instead we are seeing new downward momentum. In fact, according to Business Insider the price of U.S. oil briefly dipped below $43 a barrel on Wednesday…

Crude oil was down nearly 3% in morning trade on Wednesday.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures in New York dropped to as low as $42.97 per barrel. Futures touched a $42-handle in the last week of October, but last traded near those levels for a considerable period in August.

Another thing that I am watching is the ongoing crash of other industrial commodities. This is something that also preceded the stock market crash of 2008, and it is a clear sign that global economic activity is really slowing down.

Prices for industrial commodities such as aluminum, tin, iron ore and coal are all crashing. But the commodity that has me most alarmed personally is copper.

Economists commonly refer to it as “Dr. Copper”, and there is a very good reason for that. Looking back over history, the price of copper often makes a significant move in one direction or the other before the overall economy does. And the price of copper almost always starts declining before stocks do.

As I write this, the price of copper has fallen to $2.21, and it is already lower than at any point since the last financial crisis. To get a better perspective regarding what I am talking about, just check out this chart. This is one signal that is absolutely screaming that a major financial crisis is imminent.

One more harbinger of financial doom on the horizon is the surging U.S. dollar. The U.S. dollar surged just before the financial crisis of 2008, and now it is happening again.

Most Americans don’t understand this, but the truth is that a rising U.S. dollar puts an incredible amount of stress on emerging markets all around the globe. Since the last financial crisis, many of these emerging markets have been on a massive debt binge, and much of that debt was denominated in U.S. dollars. Now that the dollar has increased in value, emerging market borrowers are finding that it takes much more of their own local currencies to service and pay back those debts. Defaults are rapidly rising, and emerging market economies all over the world (such as Brazil) have already plunged into recession.

If the Fed does follow through with an interest rate hike in December, that is going to make things even worse. The U.S. dollar will surge even more, and emerging markets will be in even more trouble.

At the same time that the dollar is getting stronger, the euro is getting weaker. An article that was posted by CNBC on Wednesday went so far as to state that “it is now looking like the euro reaching parity with the greenback is all but guaranteed”…

The prospect of the Fed hiking interest rates in December has pushed the dollar higher, and it is now looking like the euro reaching parity with the greenback is all but guaranteed.

Strategists, however, disagree on how quickly that will happen and how much more the dollar can appreciate in the near term. That depends, they say, on the Fed, and how fast it will raise interest rates in a world where other central banks are moving in the opposite direction toward easier policy.

Goldman Sachs analysts this week reiterated that they expect euro parity with the dollar by year-end though other strategists expect the decline in the common currency against the dollar to take longer.

Let’s see, who has been warning that this would happen for more than a year? Here are just a few examples…

July 19th: “For a long time, I have been repeating my prediction that the euro would fall to parity with the U.S. dollar.”

June 28th: “As I have warned repeatedly, the euro is heading for parity with the U.S. dollar, and at some point it will drop below parity.”

May 25th: “As I have warned so many times before, the euro is headed for parity with the U.S. dollar, and then it is going to go below parity.”

In August 2014, just a little bit over a year ago, the EUR/USD was sitting above 1.30. At that time very few people out there would have ever imagined we would be talking about parity just a little more than a year later.

This is just the beginning of a time of great financial volatility. The things that we are going to witness in the months and years to come are going to be absolutely unprecedented. A massive global debt super-cycle is coming to an end, and the pain that this is going to mean for the global economy is almost too great to put into words.


"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
11/12/2015 4:57:50 PM
Bad Guys

Do as the US does: Saudi jets 'deliberately' attack hospitals in Yemen

© REUTERS/ Khaled Abdullah
As the Saudi-led alliance, backed by the United States, continues its bloody operation in Yemen, the International Committee of the Red Cross reports coalition jets are "deliberately" targeting hospitals and clinics, as the civilian death toll continues to rise.

The news follows reports of a civilian hospital coming under fire on Sunday in the southern city of Taiz, in Yemen's most densely populated region.

"The neutrality of healthcare facilities and staff is not being respected," Kedir Awol Omar, the deputy head of the ICRC delegation in Yemen, told Common Dreams. "Health facilities are deliberately attacked and surgical and medical supplies are also being blocked from reaching hospitals in areas under siege."

According to the publication, Saudi jets on Sunday repeatedly shelled the Al-Thawra hospital, considered one of the area's most important health care facilities, providing medical assistance to 50 patients daily. The attack was carried out just weeks after another significant facility - a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) clinic - was reportedly attacked in the northern city of Haydan.

On Tuesday, MSF stated that the situation in Taiz, where the half of the population is displaced, is deteriorating, as foundation activists were unable to supply hospitals in the city's most dangerous areas with medication and equipment.

"The situation in Taiz is dramatic and will only get worse in the coming weeks if no efforts are made to spare civilians from the violence and allow them to access basic services, including health facilities," Karline Kleijer, MSF's emergency manager for Yemen, said.

ICRC labeled the recent attacks "a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law."

Saudi officials refrained from commenting on the Taiz shelling, and claimed they were unaware that the earlier attack in Haydan had targeted a clinic.

"This is an alarming sign for the Yemeni people and for those trying to assist them," Laurent Sury, head of MSF emergency operations, said. "How are we to draw lessons from what happened when all we face are denials? How can we continue to work without any form of commitment that civilian structures will be spared?"

But the blame doesn't fall solely on Riyadh, according to aid workers. Amnesty International pointed out that while the jets taking part in airstrikes against hospitals were Saudi, the bombs dropped onto targets were in fact American.

"The US and other states exporting weapons to any of the parties to the Yemen conflict have a responsibility to ensure that the arms transfers they authorize are not facilitating serious violations of international humanitarian law," Donatella Rovera, Amnesty's senior crisis response adviser, claimed.

"Lack of accountability has contributed to the worsening crisis and unless perpetrators believe they will be brought to justice for their crimes, civilians will continue to suffer the consequences," Rovera added. "[The] world's indifference to the suffering of Yemeni civilians in this conflict is shocking."

So far, over a hundred hospitals across Yemen have been shelled by Saudi-led forces since the beginning of the international military campaign in March, according to official data.

Comment: If America can do it, why not Saudi Arabia? This is completely unconscionable.


"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
11/12/2015 5:07:11 PM
Mizzou college students FAKED being 'hit' by University president's car so they could get him fired for being white

Thursday, November 12, 2015 by: J. D. Heyes



(NaturalNews) A number of "racially charged incidents" that allegedly occurred in recent months at the University of Missouri are now being challenged or openly exposed as hoaxes, though far too late to have prevented the forced resignation of the school's president and chancellor.


As reported by Breitbart News, in September Payton Head, the African American president of the University of Missouri Student Association, claimed in a Facebook post that someone in a passing pickup truck hurled a racial epithet his way.

"I just want to say how extremely hurt and disappointed I am," he wrote in a Sept. 12 post. "Last night as I walking [sic] through campus, some guys riding on the back of a pickup truck decided that it would be okay to continuously scream NIGGER at me."

But the incident was apparently never reported to police and there is no way of knowing if those involved were even students at MU. Still, if it did occur, Head was right to point it out because it is inexcusable behavior.

"I don't want to see the next freshman coming in from the south side of Chicago, you know, who's black, who walks around and is called the N-word," Head later told The New York Times.

'We don't tolerate racism on campus'

Then, a few weeks later, another incident occurred involving black students preparing for homecoming. According to reports, a drunken white student verbally accosted them on campus, also hurling racial epithets. That incident was reported to campus police, and the student subsequently identified and banned from campus pending an investigation.

Also, a group of black alumni wrote a letter outlining additional incidents that allegedly happened on campus over the past 11 years, including a 2011 incident when someone spray-painted the N-word on a statue at a residence hall.

If all of these incidents are indeed true, then obviously black students have every right feel upset and be angry, and even wonder why it appears that it's alright to demean them on campus.

But what's not clear is that the university's top officials disagreed with them, including the first casualty, president Tim Wolfe. And the then-chancellor, R. Bowen Loftin, produced a video and wrote a letter that was posted online decrying racism and outlining the school's policy towards racist behavior.

"Racism exists at MU. I want to make it clear that we do not tolerate racism and prejudice on our campus. We will identify this individual from last night, and this person will be disciplined according to our campus conduct policies," he wrote following the second incident mentioned above.

Students were also upset at Wolfe over an alleged incident in which they claimed that a car he was riding in struck a black student. As Breitbart News reported:

Some of the anger directed at President Wolfe seemed to stem from an incident in which a dozen protesters shut down a homecoming parade by blocking the car carrying Wolfe and his wife. The protesters say they were angered that Wolfe didn't get out of his car to talk to them, but that reason seemed to merge with a more dubious claim that Wolfe's driver hit protester Jonathan Butler with his car.

Lies, misrepresentations and outright lies

A student protester in a video brought up the alleged incident (the video is here – she is the person speaking via the phone), which was then incorporated into "list of demands" made of the university.

"We want Tim Wolfe to admit his gross negligence, allowing the driver to hit one of the demonstrators, consenting to the physical violence of bystanders and lastly refusing to intervene when Columbia Police Department used excessive force with demonstrators," it read.

But there's no evidence in the video that Butler – or anyone – was struck by a car. But the narrative of "car hits demonstrator" is a popular tactic of the social justice warrior crowd.

One other thing: As noted at Twitchy, Head, the student body president, recently claimed in a Facebook post during the height of protests at MU that the KKK was on campus – a claim he later admitted was a lie.

Check out MediaFactWatch.com for more news and information regarding truth in reporting.


Sources:


Breitbart.com

Facebook.com

NYTimes.com




"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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