2019-11-22: News Headlines

Staff (2019-11-23). Colombia President Orders Curfew in Capital Following Unrest. truthdig.com The move follows a massive march that brought tens of thousands to the streets in a message of rejection of his conservative government.

RT (2019-11-23). Putin could have been 'FIRED' in 1998 — from top spy job that propelled him to presidency. rt.com Vladimir Putin could've had his career smashed months before becoming Russian president, a former Kremlin official claims. He says an influential PM made two attempts to sack Putin from his top job at the Federal Security Service. | Putin was in charge of the FSB between September 1998 and May 1999. His breakneck career progress then saw him become the first deputy Prime Minister, then PM, and finally Russia's caretaker President on December 31, 1999 — after Boris Yeltsin's surprise resignation. | But the current president's life story might have been quite different, claims the former head of Yeltsin's a…

RT (2019-11-23). Trump & Navy trade blows as confusion, conflicting reports swirl around review to expel SEAL accused of war crimes. rt.com A showdown between President Donald Trump and the US Navy may be shaping up over an attempt to expel a commando from the elite SEAL force. Vague statements and conflicting reports are adding to confusion about the case. | After the Navy announced that it would carry out a Trident review to consider expelling Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher from the SEALs earlier this week, Trump stepped in with a tweet, insisting that nothing of the sort would be happening. | "The Navy will NOT be taking away Warfighter and Navy Seal Eddie Gallagher's Trident Pin," the president said on Thursday. "This case was handl…

Ryan Cristián (2019-11-23). Iran False Flag Prep, US Government's Staggering Bolivia Hypocrisy, Netanyahu Indicted & Patriot Act. thelastamericanvagabond.com Welcome to The Daily Wrap Up, a concise show dedicated to bringing you the most relevant independent news, as we see it, from the last 24 hours (11/22/19). As always, take the information discussed in the video below and research it for yourself, and come to your own conclusions. Anyone telling you what the truth …

Mattea Kramer (2019-11-22). Finding Peace Amid the New Opium Wars. counterpunch.org It was evening and we were in a windowless room in a Massachusetts jail. We had just finished a class — on job interview skills — and, with only a few minutes remaining, the women began voicing their shared fear. Upon their release, would someone really hire them? Beneath that concern lurked another one: Would More

RT (2019-11-22). Authorities impose curfew in capital of Colombia, deploy 20k police against protesters. rt.com Colombian President Iván Duque instructed the authorities in Bogota to impose an overnight curfew on the entire Colombian capital, as 20,000 uniformed police were deployed to "establish order" amid anti-government protests. | "What we are facing is not a march," said Bogota Mayor Enrique Peñalosa, announcing the measure on Friday evening, describing the protesters as a small number of "criminals, vandals, looting, stealing and wanting to practically end our city." | Initially, the curfew was to apply only to Bosa, Kennedy and Ciudad Bolivar — three districts on the south side of the capital, whose…

Staff (2019-11-22). Mystery Grows Over Withholding of Aid to Lebanon. truthdig.com WASHINGTON—The Trump administration is withholding more than $100 million in U.S. military assistance to Lebanon that has been approved by Congress and is favored by his national security team, an assertion of executive control of foreign aid that is similar to the delay in support for Ukraine at the center of the impeachment inquiry. | Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday congratulated Lebanon as the country marked its independence day but made no mention of the hold-up in aid that State Department and Pentagon officials have complained about for weeks. | It came up in impeachment testimony by David Ha…

Medea Benjamin (2019-11-22). They're Killing Us Like Dogs: A Massacre in Bolivia and a Plea for Help. mintpressnews.com I am writing from Bolivia just days after witnessing the November 19 military massacre at the Senkata gas plant in the indigenous city of El Alto, and the tear-gassing of a peaceful funeral procession on November 21 to commemorate the dead. These are examples, unfortunately, of the modus operandi of the de facto government that seized control in a coup that forced Evo Morales out of power. | The coup has spawned massive protests, with blockades set up around the country as part of a national strike calling for the resignation of this new government. One well-organized blockade is in El Alto, where residents set u…

Ed Rampell (2019-11-22). 'The Two Popes': The god couple. peoplesworld.org Brazilian director Fernando Meirelles, who was Oscar-nominated for 2002's City of God and Golden Globe-nommed for 2005's The Constant Gardener, is back with another topical film, The Two Popes. At a gala in the TCL Chinese Theatre, 81-year-old Anthony Hopkins, who portrays Pope Benedict, told the American Film Institute audience Popes had a "message" of …

RT (2019-11-22). Model arrested on suspicion of gun-running after taking TOPLESS PHOTOS with assault rifle & pistol. rt.com A teenage Instagram model has found herself behind bars in Brazil after police discovered incriminating photos of her posing and dancing with a range of deadly firearms. | 19-year-old Gabriela Sara Vasconcelos Assunção was arrested on suspicion of arms trafficking on Saturday, after officers came across saucy images showing the teen kissing a pistol and, posing topless, brandishing an assault rifle. | | © Gaby Assunàßà£o/ Instagram | Assunção was first arrested alongside her boyfriend in October when a cache of guns was discovered in the car they were travelling i…

RT (2019-11-22). 'Suppressed unfairly'? John Bolton's Twitter comeback raises Resistance hopes for Trump impeachment. rt.com President Donald Trump's now-former National Security Advisor John Bolton returned to Twitter promising a "backstory" for his two-month absence, sending Trump critics into a frenzy of hope he might testify in impeachment hearings. | "Glad to be back on Twitter after more than two months. For the backstory, stay tuned," the verified account with over 770,000 followers tweeted on Friday, for the first time since Bolton's resignation — or firing, depending on who you ask — on September 10. | Glad to be back on Twitter after more than two months. For the backstory, stay tuned……..— John Bolton (…

Edward Curtin (2019-11-22). Unspeakable Memories: The Day John Kennedy Died. dissidentvoice.org There is a vast literature on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, who died on a November 22nd Friday like this in 1963. I have contributed my small share to such writing in an effort to tell the truth, honor him, and emphasize its profound importance in understanding the history of the last fifty-six …

RT (2019-11-22). Friends with everyone? Trump says US must stand with Hong Kong AND President Xi. rt.com US President Donald Trump is hedging his bets on supporting the Hong Kong 'pro-democracy' rioters, making clear he is not willing to alienate China in the process. Beijing has slammed a US 'pro-rioters' bill as massive overreach. | "We have to stand with Hong Kong, but I'm also standing with President Xi. He's my friend," Trump declared on Friday morning, in response to questions about whether he would sign the bills that both chambers of Congress approved unanimously. The move would satisfy both parties in Washington, but Beijing has warned it will halt all trade talks if the bill becomes law. | Also on rt.co…

RT (2019-11-22). Saudi-led coalition's airstrikes in Yemen down 80 percent in 2 weeks, UN envoy says. rt.com The United Nations' envoy Martin Griffiths told the UN Security Council on Friday that the number of airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition battling Houthis in Yemen has dropped nearly 80 percent in the last two weeks. | "In what is perhaps an even more important sign that something is changing in Yemen… in the last two weeks the rate has dramatically reduced: there were almost 80 percent fewer airstrikes nationwide than in the two weeks prior," Reuters quoted him as saying. | Earlier this month, Reuters quoted sources as saying that Saudi Arabia was intensifying informal talks with the Houthi movement on a c…

Ahmed Abdulkareem (2019-11-22). In WWII-Era Fashion, the Saudi-led Coalition is Weaponizing Disease in Yemen. mintpressnews.com TAIZ, YEMEN — Beyond the devastation it has caused on the back of tens of thousands of airstrikes, a crippling blockade and the intentional targeting of civilian infrastructure, the Saudi-led coalition supported by the United States has sparked an outbreak of disease and epidemics in Yemen in a manner not seen since World War II. | Yemeni activist Aseel Sweid told MintPress News how a young boy, Abdulkarim al-Ma'amari, "died of dengue fever after it spread with alarming speed in Taiz, threatening many innocents." Sweid added that three of his own brothers had been infected with dengue. "There are a huge amo…

Donald Donato (2019-11-22). Big pharma's new opium war: Exporting the addiction crisis to China. peoplesworld.org As the People's Republic of China's economy grows and integrates more fully into global commerce, so does the risk to its people's health. To meet the new demand for cancer and pain medications, China has had to harmonize its pharmaceutical regulatory structures with international ones and beef-up its investment in innovative biotech research and production. …

RT (2019-11-22). 'I want a Senate impeachment trial', Trump says in live TV phone call. rt.com President Donald Trump has said that he wants to be tried by the Senate if the House votes to impeach him. Trump told Fox & Friends that he would like to see impeachment democrats like "nut job" Adam Schiff testify. | While the Republican-controlled Senate could shoot down any articles of impeachment presented by the House, Trump told the Fox show by phone on Friday that he would like to see the inquiry against him go to a Senate trial. | "I want a trial," the president said. "I want to see Adam Schiff testify about the whistleblower — who's a fake whistleblower," he continued, referring to the intelligen…

Jeet Heer (2019-11-22). Fiona Hill's Testimony Was Devastating for Trump. thenation.com | But the foreign policy expert was too quick to blame America's ills on external forces.

RT (2019-11-22). Stunning explosive bombshell! Impeachment-pushing CNN & MSNBC fire up the crowds with deluge of flashy words in hilarious VIDEO. rt.com The impeachment hearings against President Donald Trump are hardly the epitome of high drama — but count on the mainstream media to hype up the snoozefest, with every witness dropping "bombshells" and every statement "explosive." | How many times can you repeat a word before it loses all meaning? Throughout four days of witness testimony before the House Intelligence Committee this week, anchors at CNN and MSNBC did their best to strip all impact from the words "stunning," "explosive" and "bombshell" to describe the events on Capitol Hill. | SUPERCUT: Media trying their best to hype "Bombshell!" "Explosi…

RT (2019-11-22). Who needs a trial? Just impeach the guy already, says Hillary Clinton. rt.com If all the legalities of finding grounds for impeachment are making your head hurt, Hillary Clinton has got you covered. Trump "has committed impeachable crimes," she says, and needs to be booted already — no trial required. | The ongoing impeachment inquiry against US President Donald Trump is just the first step in a drawn-out process. After gathering information and grilling witnesses, the House Intelligence Committee will send a report to the House Judiciary Committee, which will then draft articles of impeachment accordingly. The house will then vote on these articles and Trump can only then be remo…

Julie Hollar (2019-11-22). False Equivalence in the Age of Trump. fair.org Even in the Trump era, corporate media, forever insistent on an "objective" approach that always hears out "both sides," continue to exhibit a dangerous blindness to their own biases. | In "In Primetime, Two Versions of Impeachment for a Divided Nation" ( 11/16/19), the New York Times' Michael Grynbaum offered "a glimpse at the country's divided political reality"

W. T. Whitney Jr. (2019-11-22). The coup in Bolivia has U.S. fingerprints all over it. peoplesworld.org The socialist government of Bolivian President Evo Morales took power in February 2006. He and Vice President àÅlvaro García Linare on Oct. 20 had been elected to their fourth terms in office. A coup culminating on Nov. 10 removed them—a coup that the U.S. government had a big role in bringing it about. A motive …

Bill Meyer (2019-11-22). Latin America at the Toronto International Film Festival. peoplesworld.org TORONTO—Cuba, plagued by endless U.S. boycotts and sanctions, has little money left to sustain and develop their cultural exports. Films coming from Cuba dubbed or subtitled in English are becoming a rarity at film festivals in the U.S., even though there is still world interest in what's going on in Cuba. Instead, other countries are …

Tim Wheeler (2019-11-22). Fiona Hill and Fawn Hall: Witnesses to White House crimes present and past. peoplesworld.org Fiona Hill and Fawn Hall. Similar names, both assigned to the National Security Council. But how different these two women are. In 1987, Fawn Hall and Lt. Col. Oliver North spent hours shredding documents in the basement of the White House scrambling to conceal President Ronald Reagan's criminal Iran-Contra conspiracy. Granted immunity in exchange for …

RT (2019-11-22). Massacre at Moscow's top university averted thanks to vigilant students & brave lecturer. rt.com Moscow State University almost became the scene of a school massacre when a man brought a knife and a gun to class, but the students and their professor worked together and stopped a possible tragedy from occurring. | There are almost 300 freshmen attending the Faculty of Journalism at MSU, Russia's main university — and having an eye for detail is a paramount quality for any good reporter. So, some students noticed an unfamiliar face among them, even before classes began on a Friday morning. | A strange student: | The man was older than the rest of the group and was acting suspiciously, closely s…

RT (2019-11-22). Hands off: Roman Abramovich 'RULES OUT' rumored Chelsea sale. rt.com Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich has ruled out the long-rumored sale of the Premier League side he purchased in 2003, despite his visa woes with the UK government. | 'Close associates' of the club say it is no longer on the market after they received no serious bids during the 18 months in which Russian billionaire Abramovich was thought to be amenable to selling his stake in the multiple-time Premier League champions, according to The Telegraph. | It is claimed that a Middle…

RT (2019-11-22). Drones, robots, lasers, supersonic gliders & other high-tech arms: Putin wants Russian military to be up to any future challenge. rt.com The Russian military will be going all out sci-fi, with Vladimir Putin saying the plan for boosting the Armed Forces until 2033 should focus on AI and weapons based on 'new physical principles.' | With the introduction of a whole range of state-of-the-art arms in recent years, Russia has been "able to make a step forward compared to the world's other military powers," Putin said during a meeting of the Russian Security Council on Friday. | The tally of the newest weapons and hardware in the possession of the country's Armed Forces and Navy is currently over 68 percent, he said, adding that they must be increas…

Staff (2019-11-22). YouTube Is Breaking Its Own Rules About State-Sponsored Videos. truthdig.com ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they're published. | The hourlong show — not to be confused with the venerable CBS program — airs weeknights on the state-owned Russia 1 television network, which boasts the second-largest viewership in the country. Episodes can also be watched on YouTube, where the channel has 353,000 subscribers. Under a policy YouTube instituted last year, a box sh…

Don McIntosh (2019-11-22). Jury decision could kill the dockworkers' union on West coast. peoplesworld.org PORTLAND — In a decision that threatens the survival of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), a federal jury Nov. 4 held the union responsible for economic harm caused by a sustained and intentional dockworker slowdown at Port of Portland Terminal 6, and recommended that the national union and Portland-based Local 8 be ordered …

RT (2019-11-22). Bear-faced cheek: Police VIDEO shows hungry bear breaking into car for food. rt.com Law enforcement officers in California discovered a shocking surprise in an unlocked car: A hungry bear scavenging for food. The king of the forest was freed, but not before he destroyed the inside of the vehicle in his search. | In a video posted by the Pacer County Sheriff's Office, the brown bear can be seen snuffling and growling through a gap in the steamed-up window of a parked car. The sheriff's office said that the creature had managed to open the door of the unlocked vehicle, but couldn't figure out how to leave. | With hibernation season approaching, the sheriff's office warned locals not to leave…

Chris Wright (2019-11-22). Is Bernie Sanders Electable? dissidentvoice.org In his 2007 classic Deer Hunting With Jesus: Dispatches from America's Class War—a book that, in the age of Donald Trump, is more relevant than ever—Joe Bageant makes an observation that cuts to the nub of the matter. America, he says, isn't composed of some great middle class; it is an overwhelmingly working-class country. "If …

Noyma Appelbaum (2019-11-22). A campus Communist headed toward a career with the 'Pennsylvania Worker'. peoplesworld.org This is the fifth in a series of excerpted stories from a memoir by Noyma Appelbaum, "Where Were You on May Day? Transitions in Red, 1930s-1960s." Earlier installments can be read here. During my first year in college, I had little contact with left-wing political activity. My family moved to a new home, a row …

RT (2019-11-22). Hillary's white pantsuit says 'empowerment' but Tulsi's says 'fringe cult leader': NYT pilloried for two-faced style commentary. rt.com The New York Times has been accused of peddling ridiculous and shamelessly biased punditry, after the Gray Lady took aim at presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard's white pantsuit but ended up red-faced. | Style writer Vanessa Friedman argued that the Hawaii congresswoman's wardrobe made her look like a "cult leader" full of "combative righteousness." The terrifying white fabric has "connotations of the fringe, rather than the center" and even undermines "community building," the Times' writer expertly deduced. | Unfortunately, her completely reasonable fashion analysis came under fire from fringe-loving social…

RT (2019-11-22). 1.2 BILLION people's data — including social media profiles and contact info — found on unsecured Google Cloud server. rt.com A massive four-terabyte trove of sensitive personal data belonging to over a billion profiles has been found on an unsecured Google Cloud server – its owner still a mystery – in one of the largest single-source data leaks ever. | The mountain of data, including phone numbers, email addresses, and social media profiles, was sitting unprotected on an anonymous server hosted on the Google Cloud when security researchers Vinny Troia and Bob Diachenko found it while scanning for vulnerabilities last month. After they reported the massive exposure to the FBI, it disappeared within hours. It's not clear who accessed…

The Canary (2019-11-22). Plaid Cymru promises 'green jobs revolution' at manifesto launch. thecanary.co Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price has promised a "green jobs revolution" in Wales at his party's general election manifesto launch.He said plans for a green industrial revolution include significant investment in rail and bus travel, three tidal lagoons, a barrage and a new offshore wind farm.Price said Plaid would invest £20 billion over the next 10 years from a national reconstruction fund, which would include the electrification of all mainline rail lines, creating tens of thousands of jobs.Speaking from Coleg y Cymoedd college in Nantgarw near Cardiff, he said: "This transformative vision, central to the We…

WSWS (2019-11-22). Attend "Free Assange and Manning" meetings this weekend in Australia and New Zealand. wsws.org All those who value and uphold core democratic principles, and who support the freedom of Assange and Manning, should attend the meetings this weekend.

WSWS (2019-11-22). Sydney Morning Herald columnist defends Swedish frame-up of Assange. wsws.org Miller's article had the character of a rearguard action, aimed at defending the discredited lies and slanders that have been used to justify the persecution of Julian Assange.

Simon Davis-Cohen (2019-11-22). The H-2A Farmworker Program's False "Compromise" progressive.org The Trump Administration's far-right vision for immigration involves a domestic work program for people facing the threat of deportation and the expansion of an exploitative "guest worker" arrangement.

teleSUR (2019-11-22). Greece: 1,200 More Guards To 'Shut The Door' On Migrants. telesurenglish.net In anticipation of what could be a new wave of migrant arrivals, Greece's Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Friday announced that his administration will upgrade its patrolling operations and deploy 1,200 additional border guards to "shut the door" to migrants not entitled to stay. | RELATED: | 94 Refugees, Migrants Rescued Off Libya's Coast | "In Greece are welcomed only those we choose. Those who are not welcomed will be returned," PM Mitsotakis said and added that doors will remain close…

WSWS (2019-11-22). US activist who sheltered migrants found not guilty in second trial. wsws.org The verdict, after less than two hours of deliberation, reflects the broad support for humanitarian aid for immigrants.

Chip Gibbons (2019-11-22). New Report on FBI Spying Shows Need for Congressional Investigation. globalresearch.ca Clearing the FOG (forces of greed) hosts Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers interviewed Chip Gibbons, an expert on Constitutional Law and the legal and policy counsel for Defending Rights and Dissent about a recent right to protest victory in Washington, …

Derek Royden (2019-11-22). A return to feudalism? The aftermath of Bolivia's coup. nationofchange.org This coup is a disaster, and besides Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, no major North American politician has pushed back against it.

Max Blumenthal (2019-11-22). CIA helped shape 'Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan' series into bigoted Venezuela regime change fantasy. thegrayzone.com Analysis by researcher Tom Secker reveals how Amazon's regime change fantasy "Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan" was shaped by CIA and…

Ajit Singh (2019-11-22). Hong Kong's opposition unites with Washington hardliners to 'preserve the US's own political and economic interests'. thegrayzone.com While claiming to fight for "self-determination," Hong Kong opposition leaders are collaborating with regime-change neoconservatives in Washington to "preserve the…

Medea Benjamin (2019-11-22). "They're Killing us Like Dogs" — A Massacre in Bolivia and a Plea for Help. counterpunch.org I am writing from Bolivia just days after witnessing the November 19 military massacre at the Senkata gas plant in the indigenous city of El Alto, and the tear-gassing of a peaceful funeral procession on November 21 to commemorate the dead. These are examples, unfortunately, of the modus operandi of the de facto government that More

Medea Benjamin (2019-11-22). "They're Killing Us Like Dogs"—A Massacre in Bolivia and a Plea for Help. commondreams.org Bolivian riot police breaks up a massive funeral procession that turned into an anti-government demonstration in La Paz on November 21, 2019. (Photo: Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP/Getty Images) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/bolivia_killing_us_like_dogs1.jpg

Prof Michel Chossudovsky (2019-11-22). "Wipe the Soviet Union Off the Map", 204 Atomic Bombs against 66 Major Cities, US Nuclear Attack against USSR Planned During World War II. globalresearch.ca According to a secret document dated September 15, 1945, "the Pentagon had envisaged blowing up the Soviet Union with a coordinated nuclear attack directed against 66 major urban areas.

Staff (2019-11-22). Hundreds of Thousands Join National Strike in Colombia. truthout.org In Colombia, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets Thursday in the largest national strike the country has seen in years. Labor unions, students, teachers, Indigenous and Afro-Colombian activists joined in peaceful marches across urban and rural Colombia as anger mounts against right-wing President Iván Duque and his cabinet. The protests were triggered by Duque's proposed labor reforms and cuts to the pension system, as well as a recent military airstrike against a camp of alleged dissident rebel drug…

Sam Husseini (2019-11-22). Can the Religious Left Take Down Nuclear Weapons? commondreams.org Grady and the six others—the Kings Bay Plowshares 7—pleaded with the jury to look to their conscience. The activists were following the biblical edict to turn swords into plowshares, after all. (Photo: Kings Bay 7) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/kings_bay_plowshares_0.jpeg

IMEMC News (2019-11-22). Illegal Israeli Colonists Injure Eight Palestinians In Hebron. imemc.org A group of fanatic Israeli colonists, illegally squatting on Palestinian lands in Hebron, in the southern part of the occupied West Bank, attacked, on Friday evening, many Palestinians, including children, wounding eight. Palestinian activist Jamal Es'eifan said the colonists first attacked a shop, owned by Nasser Fahed al-Ja'bari, and smashed …