EDITORIAL
Obama Going Down In Flames—Pass Glass-Steagall Now
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—Both within the U.S. and around the world, Obama is being ridiculed and denounced for his mass killing, his war crimes, his lies, and his frantic (but failing) effort at “manufactured hysteria” against Russia. Virtually no one but the lying mass media and the most die-hard neocons around Obama and Hillary Clinton believes a word of it.
An interview with WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange was broadcast on Fox News Tuesday night, in which Assange reasserted that the e-mails from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta did not come from Russia, as Obama and his “intelligence” team have asserted, nor from any state actor. Assange added that WikiLeaks had never revealed its sources in its 10 years of activity, and would not now, but neither had it ever been wrong, nor even accused of being wrong. As multiple intelligence experts have shown, there is no proof, nor even credible evidence, that Russia had anything to do with obtaining and leaking the e-mails.
But truth is not of concern to the dying breed of British Imperial assets. CIA chief John Brennan, best known for his weekly sessions with Obama to map out the week’s drone kill list, went on the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) Tuesday to rant that the information showing that Russia interfered in the election was absolutely true, but that he couldn’t reveal that information yet. Asked about the CIA’s “slam dunk” proof (as then CIA Director George Tenet said at the time) that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, Brennan responded that that had happened “light years” ago, and that now the CIA only tells the truth.
In Turkey, Turkish Prime Minister Bengali Yardarm issued a statement saying that, although Obama claims to be fighting terrorism, he has in fact “sent arms to terrorist organizations…. It is only Turkey that fights against Daesh [ISIS]. The United States and others do nothing…. What we expect from the new administration is to bring an end to this shame.” Turkish leaders are seriously questioning the continued use of Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base by U.S. forces, since they refuse to help Turkish and Russian forces fighting Daesh in Syria.
But disrupting Obama’s war plans will mean little in the long run if the disintegration of the entire Western financial system is not reversed, which is only possible through the immediate revival of Glass-Steagall. The new U.S. Congress opened this week, with a number of leading Democrats expressing their intent to work with Trump on issues of mutual concern, naming in particular major infrastructure investments and the revision of the disastrous NAFTA free trade deal. These are useful and important measures, but without Glass-Steagall, shutting down the floating crap game centered on Wall Street, nothing else is possible, as the onrushing implosion of the trans-Atlantic financial empire will wash away all secondary efforts to restore the economy. Only with Glass-Steagall can the stage be set for a Hamiltonian credit system, to direct credit into reconstruction and the frontiers of scientific progress.
LaRouche Political Action Committee organizers were on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, meeting with many new and returning Senators and Representatives. They were told that the Glass-Steagall bills from the last Congress will be reintroduced into the new Congress within a matter of days.
But so far the Democrats have failed to take actions which would drive Trump to do what he said he would do during the campaign—namely, support Glass-Steagall. By forcing the issue immediately—before another crash hits—a bipartisan majority can and must restore sanity to the nation, reviving government of the people, by the people, and for the people—not of Wall Street, by Wall Street, and for Wall Street. It was precisely the recognition of this degradation of the citizens of the nation on behalf of Wall Street which caused the solid defeat of the Obama/Clinton campaign in 2016.
Wednesday Jan. 11 will be a “Day of Action” on the Hill by LaRouche PAC, to provide the necessary “uplifting” kick in the ass to hesitant and/or cowardly Members of Congress, to act now.
U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC
Donald Trump Refuses To Capitulate on Russian Scare—Quotes Assange in a Tweet.
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—WikiLeaks founder Julian Asante’s interview with Fox last week was broadcast on Tuesday night. He issued strong advice for the Democratic Party regarding those who are peddling Obama’s fairy tale about the Russians’ interference in the election: “They will seize on this and harp on it for the next four years. I think that’s a mistake. I think that’s a mistake not just in fact, that’s a mistake for the U.S. Democratic Party. I think it’s a stupid maneuver.”
Assange reiterated that neither Russia, nor any other state actor provided WikiLeaks with the e-mails of the Democratic National Committee, nor those of Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta. He also ridiculed Podesta: “Podesta gave out that his password was the word ‘password’…. So this is something a 14-year-old kid—a 14-year-old kid could have hacked….”
As to the actual source, Assange said: “We have the trust of our readers, having never got it wrong, not even—not even one sustained allegation, even. We have a perfect record in relation to authenticating the material that we publish. That’s a very valuable reputation to have and we try and preserve it…. But WikiLeaks is a source protection organization. We are famous for never having exposed one of our sources over 10 years. That’s why sources trust us and they come to us.”
Asked about former British diplomat Craig Murray, who has reported that he personally was handed the documents from a disgruntled Democratic National Committee (DNC) member who was angry about the betrayal of Bernie Sanders, and then gave them to WikiLeaks, Assange said that Murray was a friend, but that he would not say more about the source, other than that it was not Russian.
Donald Trump issued a Tweet this morning: “Julian Assange said ‘a 14 year old could have hacked Podesta’—why was DNC so careless? Also said Russians did not give him the info!”
He had also tweeted Tuesday night, regarding a planned briefing from the intelligence directors on the supposed Russian hacking: “The ‘Intelligence’ briefing on so-called ‘Russian hacking’ was delayed until Friday, perhaps more time needed to build a case. Very strange!”
Meanwhile, the “normal suspects” are up to their old tricks. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, former CIA Director Mike Morrell, former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, former U.S. Ambassador to Russia (and rabid Putin-hater) Michael McFaul, and 11 others, issued a letter calling for an “independent commission” to investigate the charge against Russia, or else the United States would be “vulnerable to another attack and, possibly worse, permit and normalize future interference.”
Obama’s Killers: Trust Us; We’re ‘100% Certain’ T’were Russkies That Hacked Us
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—The State Department’s bully spokesman, John Kirby, assured CNN with a straight face last night that “President Obama and this administration is 100% certain in the role that Russia played in trying to sow doubt and confusion” in the U.S. elections, through cyber hacking. “And that’s not just an assessment by the President…. It’s an assessment by the entire intelligence community…. The information is there, and it’s rock solid.”
Such “rock solid” evidence as tracing a hack back to a keyboard using Cyrillic characters, as unnamed U.S. officials told CNN yesterday? Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov responded acerbically to the stupidity of that assertion that “Cyrillic characters can be used in any way.”
Likewise, CIA Director John Brennan told PBS, in an interview the first part of which was broadcast last night, that people—such as President-elect Trump—should not doubt the Russian hacking. Asked about the certainty of the CIA in light of their “certainty” of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. Brennan responded: There’s no comparison. “It’s been light-years since that Iraq WMD report had been done. And there has been tremendous … further development of our analytic capabilities … there is no intelligence community worldwide that has the capabilities, the expertise, the analytic capability as the U.S. intelligence community.”
Brennan admitted, however, that the report on the Russian role is still “in its final throes of production” [sic], but he said it will be shared with the President “within days.” When asked, he allowed as how the report could be shared with President-elect Trump, “if President Obama says that that’s what should happen.” Will it prove “beyond a shadow of a doubt” that Russian officials were trying to interfere with the U.S. election? Brennan did not answer yes, but said that “it will address what Russia was doing, how it was doing it, and how we know that.”
Saudi Arabian terror supporter that he is, Brennan used the PBS interview to again lament that with Russian assistance, the Syrians are defeating ISIS, lying that “the scorched-earth policy” which the Russians carried out in Syria has “led to devastation and thousands upon thousands of innocent deaths,” using “reckless military action to mow down so many” in the Syrian “opposition.”
STRATEGIC WAR DANGER
Turkish Prime Minister Calls on Trump To Change Obama’s ‘Shameful’ Policy
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim has called on U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to end the Obama administration’s “shameful” policy toward Turkey over the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) forces. “The world talks about Daesh [Islamic State] but it does not fight [against it]. It is only Turkey that fights against Daesh. The United States and others do nothing. They just supply the PYD with weapons,” said Yildirim on Jan. 3, in a weekly parliamentary address to his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) members according to Hurriyet Daily News. “What we expect from the new administration is to bring an end to this shame,” Yildirim said, referring to the incoming Trump administration. “We do not hold the new administration responsible for this situation, because it was the achievement of the Obama administration.”
On Dec. 29, 2016, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused the U.S. of directly supplying the PYD with weapons. “You sent arms to terror organizations, but then say, ‘We sent ammunition, not arms.’ We don’t buy that or accept it. Although we are partners in NATO, you are giving this support to terrorist organizations, not us. Are the terrorist organizations your partner in NATO? If we are strategic partners in NATO, you should stand with us,” Erdogan said.
Turkey ‘Questions’ U.S. Use of Incirlik Air Base
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—Turkey’s Foreign Minister and Defense Minister are now questioning why the U.S. is using Incirlik air base when the U.S.-led anti-Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL/Daesh) coalition forces but are not doing anything to support Turkey. “Our people ask, why are they using the Incirlik Air Base [if the coalition does not provide aerial support to the Euphrates Shield operation]? We allowed not only the U.S. but also other countries’ jets to use Incirlik to jointly fight” ISIL, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told state-run Anadolu Agency. “What purpose are you serving if you do not provide aerial support against Daesh in the most sensitive operation for us?” he further asked. “The U.S. is a very important ally for us. We have cooperation in every field. But there is the reality of a confidence crisis in the relationship at the moment,” Cavusoglu was quoted as saying in today’s Hurriyet Daily News.
Cavusoglu reiterated that the U.S. had promised that the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) would move from Manbij to the east of the Euphrates River, which has not happened, and the U.S. had provided arms support to the Syrian Kurdish group. Turkey charges they are linked directly to the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) which is carrying out a terror campaign in Turkey, “Giving arms to the YPG, the U.S. chose a terrorist organization over its ally,” he said.
Slamming Obama, he said, “We know that PYD/YPG forces are in Manbij, as our President stated yesterday [to U.S. President Barack Obama]. Obama said he agrees with us on the subject that these forces should return to the east of the Euphrates,” and stressed that Washington has been in agreement with Turkey from the beginning, but the White House “had not kept its promises.”
Defense Minister Fikri Isik raised the same issue saying that the U.S. refusal to support Turkey “raises questions” about the mission of the Incirlik Air Base. “We hope that all coalition forces, primarily the U.S., give air and other support that Turkey needs in the Euphrates Shield operation,” Isik told journalists in Ankara. “But it is thought-provoking that despite the fact we have been NATO allies for years, and that a coalition has been established to fight against ISIL, the coalition does not support the Euphrates Shield operation launched by the Free Syrian Army and supported by the Turkish Armed Forces. Al-Bab is a very critical location in the anti-ISIL fight,” he said.
COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM
Draghi Would Create Another ‘Greek’ Economic Collapse in Italy
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—According to the European financial blog Bruegel, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi is trying to impose on Italian banks, capital requirements significantly higher than could be met by large German banks, and which Draghi has previously imposed only on the banks of Greece. Draghi’s excruciating pressure on the major Greek banks during 2015 was crucial to his role in forcing the Greek government to accept new levels of drastic austerity; in effect, to keep the Greek people paying for the losses of the biggest banks in Europe.
As reported in Forbes Dec. 31 by British financial columnist Frances Coppola, “Exactly why the ECB has increased the capital requirement by so much is unclear. The Bank of Italy explains that a special meeting of the ECB Board set the minimum CET1 [Tier 1 core equity capital] ratio to 8% and the minimum total capital ratio to 11.5%. This is substantially above the legal minimum CET1 ratio of 5.5%, and … also higher than the level reached by ten of the largest European banks in the stress tests, including Germany’s Deutsche Bank. Silvia Merler [of Bruegel] observes that 8% is the same CET1 ratio as was set for the Greek banks in the 2015 recapitalization.”
Draghi’s demand intentionally and forcefully threw into question both the solvency and liquidity of Monte dei Paschi (MPS) bank, and the Italian government’s attempted “solvent-bank bailout” of a number of large banks. It gave the government and the banks, instead, a strong push toward a politically suicidal “bail-in” or confiscation of tens of thousands of bank bondholders. “Bailing in” the EU-required 8% of total liabilities of MPS, according to Bruegel, would mean bailing in nearly 100% of MPS’s junior, or subordinated, bonds, wiping out the savings of many.
The “solvent-bank bailout” Italy is attempting is called a precautionary recapitalization. Coppola goes on, “If MPS’s precautionary recapitalization failed, it is unlikely that others would succeed. And the hoped-for €13 billion private sector recapitalization of Unicredit, Italy’s largest bank, would also be likely to [fail].” Thus another, bigger, forced “bail-in.”
Coppola concludes this “would impose losses on banks and investors across Europe. And it would knock a huge hole in the Italian economy, already highly indebted and mired in recession…. The ECB is no doubt well aware of the potential for Eurozone financial system meltdown if this recapitalization fails. Could it be weighing very carefully … how much of the cost of propping up the European banking system can we dump on the Italians?”
THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER
Abe Wants Independence from the U.S., and Is Getting It Through Putin’s Intervention
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—Daisuke Kotegawa, a former Japanese Finance Ministry official and a global statesman, when asked by EIR what direction Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will take regarding his earlier push to dump the pacifist Japanese Constitution, answered that Abe’s primary motivation is “independence” for Japan. His effort to end the Constitutional ban on Japan taking part in foreign wars, Kotegawa said, which has guided Japan’s foreign policy since World War II, was aimed at ending Japan’s dependence on U.S. military occupation and the U.S. nuclear umbrella.
But now, with the December agreements between Abe and Vladimir Putin, Abe has been given the opportunity to assert independence through a new economic paradigm, rather than through a military policy, Kotegawa said. The Abe-Putin agreements call for joint development of the four contested islands (Kuril/Northern Territories, a territorial conflict which has prevented a formal peace treaty between Russia and Japan), along with extensive Japanese investments in the development of the Russian Far East. Through this process, Putin told the Japanese press, the two nations can build trust, based on real economic cooperation, just as Russia and China built such trust though development to achieve their strong partnership today.
Twice before, in 1956 and 2000, an agreement was nearly reached to divide the four islands. In both cases, the U.S. essentially demanded that Japan step away from the deal, and Japan capitulated. But the deal is now back on the table, based not only on good sense, but on extensive real development and trust-building measures, demonstrating that Japan is far less likely to accept U.S. dictates.
Kotegawa indicated that Abe’s LDP party has already put a hold on the plan for a constitutional change regarding their military posture.
Lyndon LaRouche noted today that the powerful case put forth by Putin in Japan has dramatically strengthened Japan as a viable sovereign nation, but added that this process will also contribute to nation building in Europe, for nations to free themselves from the British imperial grip represented by the EU and the Eurozone.
SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE
Slow Pace of New Nuclear Plants in 2016: Indicative of the World Depression
Jan. 4 (EIRNS)—The World Nuclear Association yesterday released its round-up of existing global nuclear industry generating capacity at the end of 2016. The numbers dramatize the massive mobilization that is necessary to provide enough power for even a minimal growth trajectory for, with some exceptions, an otherwise dying world economy.
Global net generating nuclear capacity increased slightly to 391 GW up from 382 GW, for the whole world last year. That there was even this barely perceptible increase is thanks to the five new reactors that came online in China, which was half the total of ten worldwide. Other additions were in South Korea, India, Pakistan, Russia, and TVA’s Watts Bar plant. Three plants with a combined 1,400 MW capacity were shut down in the U.S. last year. At the end of 2016, there were 447 operating reactors around the world and 60 under construction.
This picture should be compared to the projections by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and international energy bodies soon after President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1953 Atoms for Peace initiative, that, conservatively, there would be 1,000 nuclear reactors in operation in the U.S. by the turn of the century.
The London-based World Nuclear Association has developed its own vision for the future of electrical energy, its World Nuclear News reports. Although motivated by its fantastic belief in climate change, the Association’s target for nuclear energy is to provide 25% of world electricity in 2050, which would require 1,000 GW of new nuclear capacity to be built.
