North Korea launched an unidentified short-range missile in the direction of the East Sea on Saturday, according to South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said that the North “fired a missile from its east coast town of Wonsan in the eastern direction at 9:06 a.m. today.”
The incident marks the first missile launch since November 28, 2017 when it launched an ICBM which traveled 600 miles in 50 minutes until crashing into the Sea of Japan.
South Korean and US authorities “are analyzing details of the missile,” added the JCS.
Developing…
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2Y5hDRu Tyler Durden
Just when you thought things on the West Coast could not get any more insane, we are reminded there is no limit to what a triggered imagination can come up with to support the disassociated state so many Bay Area liberals seem capable of.
By way of background, cars parked at the Golden Gate Bridge have been frequent targets of burglary, prompting local authorities to post signs thoughtfully warning visitors to not leave cash or valuables in their vehicles.
Following what we considered somewhat of a standard – white backgrounds with black stick-figures pretty much the worldwide default for any simple efficient warning sign?
Does that make it ok? Oh no, not at all, not in San Francisco – because, according to the SFExaminer, the signs, which went up in February, were alleged by some bridge visitors to depict a “person of color” in “robber’s clothes,” said spokesperson Priya Clemens.
And so, just as you might expect, responding to concerns that the stick figure may have been offensive, the district swapped out the signs for ones featuring an orange-colored stick figure instead.
“The signs are meant to alert, not offend,” Clemens said. “We want to keep the focus on the main message of safety.”
Taxpayer money well spent, America!!!
P.S. Look how racist Russia is!!
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2DMUIT4 Tyler Durden
The healthcare system in the United States is deeply broken, and it is causing massive financial pain for millions of American families.
Previously, I have published articles where I talked about how medical bills are the primary factor in two-thirds of all personal bankruptcies in the United States, and that Americans had to borrow a whopping 88 billion dollars last year to cover medical costs. This is happening even though more than 90 percent of all Americans have some form of health coverage. Thanks to soaring deductibles and health insurance policies that are absolutely riddled with loopholes, more Americans than ever are being wiped out by medical bills. And now a brand new study that was conducted by researchers from the American Cancer Society has discovered that 137.1 million Americans suffered “medical financial hardship in the past year”. The following comes directly from the study…
Approximately 137.1 million (95% CI 132.7–141.5) adults reported any medical financial hardship in the past year. Hardship is more common for material, psychological and behavioral domains in adults aged 18–64 years (28.9%, 46.9%, and 21.2%, respectively) than in adults aged ≥ 65 years (15.3%, 28.4%, and 12.7%, respectively; all p < .001). Lower educational attainment and more health conditions were strongly associated with hardship intensity in multivariable analyses in both age groups (p < .001). In the younger group, the uninsured were more likely to report multiple domains of hardship (52.8%), compared to those with some public (26.5%) or private insurance (23.2%) (p < .001). In the older group, individuals with Medicare only were more likely to report hardship in multiple domains (17.1%) compared to those with Medicare and public (12.1%) or Medicare and private coverage (10.1%) (p < .001).
We are the wealthiest nation on the entire planet, and we should have the greatest healthcare system.
This shouldn’t be happening.
And the conclusion that the study ultimately reached is that things are likely to get even worse as we move into the future…
Medical financial hardship is common in the USA, especially in adults aged 18–64 years and those without health insurance coverage. With trends towards higher patient cost-sharing and increasing health care costs, risks of hardship may increase in the future.
Today, many Americans try to avoid our healthcare system as much as possible because they are afraid of being hit with absolutely ridiculous bills.
Just consider the case of 9-year-old Oakley Yoder. She went for a hike in the woods at summer camp, and a snake bite forced her to go to the hospital…
It was dusk as Oakley Yoder and the other summer camp kids hiked back to their tents at Illinois’ Jackson Falls last July. As the group approached a mound of boulders blocking the path, Oakley, then 9, didn’t see the lurking snake — until it bit a toe on her right foot.
“I was really scared,” Oakley said. “I thought that I could either get paralyzed or could actually die.”
Total bill: $142,938, including $67,957 for four vials of antivenin ($55,577.64 was charged for air ambulance transport). The balance included a ground ambulance charge and additional hospital and physician charges, according to the family’s insurer, IU Health Plans.
This is yet another example that shows that our current system needs to be totally dismantled and rebuilt from scratch.
You could buy an entire house for $142,938.
Here are some more facts from a previous article that show just how dramatically the U.S. healthcare system has failed…
–3.7 trillion dollars was spent on health care in the United States in 2018. That breaks down to $10,739 per person.
I could go on and on all day, but let me give you just one more example of how flawed our healthcare system has become.
John Kapoor, the billionaire founder of Insys Theraputics, was just found guilty of bribing doctors to prescribe high doses of a painkiller called Subsys…
Kapoor oversaw a marketing strategy at Insys that hired doctors as speakers at educational seminars as cover to pay them more than $1m to prescribe high doses of Subsys to patients who did not need it. Prosecutors said the seminars were no more than social gatherings at expensive New York restaurants followed by company sales reps taking the physicians to strip clubs and bars.
Prosecutors showed the jury spreadsheets of payments to doctors and how much the company profited from each bribe. In one instance, the company paid nearly $260,000 to two New York doctors who wrote more than $6m worth of Subsys prescriptions in 2014. Insys employees also posed as doctors to give insurance companies invented diagnoses to get approval for payments for the drug.
In this case justice was done, but the truth is that this sort of stuff happens in the medical world constantly.
Our entire healthcare system is now completely dominated by the pharmaceutical giants, the big health insurance companies and greedy corporate interests.
They don’t care about us. All they really care about is making as much money as possible, and if people get hurt in the process they are willing to live with that.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2VKCH2e Tyler Durden
In the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, an exploding population has dramatically lowered standards of sanitation. Overcrowding has created a near-constant state of traffic gridlock. And – oh yeah – the city’s buildings are slowly sinking into the marshlands upon which they were built.
Yet, with its population expected to eclipse Tokyo’s over the next ten years, earning it the title of world’s largest mega-city, Jakarta is swiftly becoming an inhospitable place for the seat of government of one of the world’s largest countries and fastest-growing economies. So the Indonesia government is planning to shift most of its important government functions somewhere else on the archipelago.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Monday ordered his government ministers to formulate a financing plan to relocate Indonesia’s capital, a plan that Planning Minister Bambang Brodjonegoro expects will cost $33 billion – or 466 trillion rupiah. That cost reflects developing 40,000 hectares of land, enough space for 1.5 million residents.
Of course, the tab could be lowered if only part of the state apparatus is shifted. Widodo is also planning to establish an authority dedicated to the move (most immediately, they will need to find a location), according to Bloomberg.
The FT reports that Palangkaraya in Central Kalimantan province has been mentioned as one possible location, and the government has looked at three cities that could be potential candidates all on the island of Borneo.
Palangka Raya, a city of 200,000 people, has been named in the past as a potential alternative to Jakarta. It was designed in the 1950s by Sukarno, Indonesia’s founding president and an architect, who intended it to become the new national capital.
But regarding the location, only one thing is certain: The government wants the new capital to be located outside of Java, the largest island in the Indonesian archipelago.
Widodo, who is widely expected to have prevailed in Indonesia’s presidential vote, which took place two weeks ago, would ideally like to move the executive branch, all government ministries, and the legislature to the new city, along with all defense and security authorities. Meanwhile, the central bank and all financial authorities would remain in Jakarta.
Some have argued that it’s unrealistic to expect the private sector to help, since most companies would be unwilling to move their headquarters away from Jakarta.
But Indonesia wouldn’t be the first country to decide the location of its capital based on the course of economic development: Widodo cited Brazil, Malaysia, South Korea and Australia as examples of successful countries that embraced this line of planning.
And underscoring the necessity for a move, scientists have estimated that, at the current rate, 95% of North Jakarta will be underwater by 2050, displacing nearly 2 million people, as the city sinks into a bog.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2vCAjfm Tyler Durden
A junior Canadian gas E&P company has shut down abruptly, leaving as many as 4,700 wells behind, CBC reports, quoting the Alberta Energy Regulator, which said it had sent Trident Exploration Corp. an order to manage its wells, to which the company did not respond.
Trident closed two days ago and announced it would not be returning any money to shareholders or holders of unsecured bonds, adding it had well abandonment and reclamation liabilities of US$244.78 million (C$329 million) to deal with.
According to the Alberta Energy Regulator, these 4,700 wells add to more than 3,000 abandoned wells in Canada’s oil heartland that are currently awaiting remediation. The regulator also said it had been working with the company to smooth its exit from the industry and had ordered it to decommission the wells or transfer them to another company. Trident failed to comply with the order, the AER said.
“Trident does not have the funds to operate its infrastructure or enter into creditor protection. As a result, they have decided to walk away, leaving more than 4,400 licensed sites, many of them active, without an operator,” the watchdog told CBC.
Data from the Alberta Energy Regulator saysthere are some 170,000 abandoned wells in the province, most of these sealed and taken out of service or reclaimed. The number represents more than a third of the total well count in Alberta, with the watchdog noting in its overview on the topic that even their abandonment, the wells remain the responsibility of the company that owns them.
Two years ago, think tank C. D. Howe warned Alberta was facing a well cleanup and reclamation bill of US$5.95 billion (C$8 billion) and needed to change the way it made companies take financial charge of the abandonment and reclamation of their wells. Since then, this figure has grown.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2LmVlcB Tyler Durden
After a century of elite climbers taking on the dangerous challenge of ascending the world’s highest peak since it was first conquered in 1921, which has seen numbers making the attempt explode in recent years to the point of causing deadly climber traffic jams of sorts along the key routes in subzero oxygen-deprived temperatures, Mount Everest is now subject of a garbage crisis.
New reports have found that 6,613 pounds of trash, or over 3 tons, have been collected from Mount Everest since mid-April, with much more trash expected to be hauled off the mountain. And worse, human remains are still to be found all over the mountain— in some instances rapidly warming temperatures have uncovered bodies of climbers who many years or even decades ago perished on the journey.
Thousands of pounds of trash, including feces, and even human remains have compiled atop Everest. Image source: Getty
The trek is so dangerous, and the threat of severe oxygen deprivation so ever present, that most often climbers who lose their lives at the upper levels of the mountain can’t be safely retrieved, and are simply “buried” by layers of snow and ice.
As a BBC reported noted earlier this year, nearly 300 climbers total have died on the mountain since the 1920s, two-thirds of which are still buried on the side of the mountain.
This along with the fact that in order to survive the trip up and down climbers often have to simply leave trash behind — everything from meal wrappers to spent oxygen containers — have made Everest the “world’s highest dump… covered in tons of trash and dead bodies” according to a USA Today report this week.
In Alaska, North America’s tallest mountain, Denali, is also having a similar issue, only with human poop.
Last month, it was reported that Denali could be covered in 66 tons of poop as glaciers melt away in the coming decades and perhaps much sooner – a process that’s speeding up thanks to climate change. — FOX News
The report highlighted that massive local coordinated effort is underway to remove a total of 11 tons of garbage from the mountain over a period of 45 days. This will include both biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste such as oxygen canisters, kitchen waste, beer bottles and poop.
Image via Filmy Mantra
Nepal’s tourism director of tourism, Dandu Raj Ghimire, explained the initiative as follows: “Our goal is to extract as much waste as possible from Everest so as to restore glory to the mountain. Everest is not just the crown of the world, but our pride,” according to The Hindu.
“Everything on Everest, other than rock and snow, will be brought back,” Tika Ram Gurung, secretary of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, was further quoted as saying in a separate report.
“The goal is to send the message that we should keep this mountain pollution free,” he said.
Mount Everest’s garbage problem, via YouTube
A 12-member cleaning team plans to cover as much territory as can be accomplished safely, and intends to retrieve bodies along the way as well — four of which they’ve reportedly already retrieved successfully.
A recent BBC report said the UK government had successfully retrieved the bodies of ten British nationals from Mt. Everest in recent years, but the official in charge of the effort acknowledged that “clearly more and more of them are emerging now.”
Mt. Everest file photo, via Filmy Mantra
One local Nepalese official also told media outlets that due to warming temperatures, “dead bodies that remained buried all these years are now becoming exposed.”
Over 5,000 international climbers have attempted the world’s highest peak since its popularity as the world’s greatest challenge began in the 20th century, with another nearly 800 set to try this year.
Likely the increased traffic will cause significant and potentially deadly climbing delays, given also the region is notorious for sudden bouts of extreme weather, which can leave people stuck.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2LlGAGT Tyler Durden
Many of Chicagoland’s elite know exactly how to pass the property-tax buck onto other residents. For decades they’ve used their powerful connections to cut their own property tax bills and push the costs onto other unsuspecting residents. And that’s left many lower-income homeowners footing ever-larger tax bills.
The latest, most blatant example is Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s removal of toilets from one of his two Chicago mansions. Pritzker ripped out the toilets and convinced then-Cook County Assessor Joseph Berrios the home was “uninhabitable.”
That move tanked the assessed value of the home and reduced Pritzker’s property tax bill by nearly $100,000. His tax savings became tax hikes for other homeowners.
While Pritzker’s actions are scandalous, they are nothing new in Illinois. House Speaker Mike Madigan and Chicago Alderman Ed Burke’s law firms have been helping commercial property owners in Chicago lower the assessed values of their buildings for decades, to values far lower than the buildings are worth. That’s where the big dollars are, as we highlight later in this piece.
But Pritzker’s actions exemplify exactly how the system works. Learn the tricks, “torture the data,” hire a well-connected lawyer and get the assessor’s buy-in. And just like that, a tax bill is cut.
Smaller tax bills for some doesn’t mean a local government takes in less in taxes. Instead, the city and county’s remaining residents are required to make up the difference.
That problem – how lower-income homeowners have been hurt by tax shifting – was well documented by the Tribune in 2017 in a four-part series covering the full extent of the assessment process and its corruption.
The struggling residents in Chicago’s south suburbs have suffered the most from the unfair assessment process. Wirepoints recently highlighted how residents in that area are now living with collapsed home prices and sky-high effective property tax rates that sometimes reach double digits.
Using the system
Pritzker used the corrupt system run by Berrios to successfully lower the assessment on his Chicago mansion back in 2015. The mansion was originally valued by the assessor at over $6 million. That was until Pritzker had the toilets removed.
Under a murky rule that allows properties to be deemed “uninhabitable,” Berrios lowered the assessed value of the property to just under $1.1 million. That dropped Pritzker’s total tax bills over several years by a total of more than $330,000 – much of which was passed on to other residents within the same tax jurisdictions in the form of higher tax bills.
Pritzker eventually paid the money back, and the scandal didn’t stop him from getting elected governor. But it could add Pritzker to the growing list of indicted Illinois governors. As it turns out, the feds have been investigating the whole toilet scheme since October of last year.
Regardless of how that plays out, Pritzker’s actions provide the perfect example of how property scams and deals impact other people’s properties, their taxes and their lives.
That same tax shift happens when lawmakers like Madigan and Burke engage in the appeal process through their high-powered law firms. They use their influence and relationships with politicians like Berrios – the assessor was also simultaneously the Cook County Democratic Party Chairman for many years – to bring down the property values of major Chicago properties.
Crain’s recently looked at how top commercial properties in Chicago are assessed and compared them to the recent sales prices of those same buildings. The flaws in the process – and the impact they have on Chicagoland residents – becomes evident quickly.
Crain’s analysis looked at:
“the 50 biggest property sales in the county over the past five years and compares the sales prices with the values of the same properties as estimated by the assessor’s office. The gap is stark: The prices of all 50 properties add up to $17.1 billion, while the assessor values them at only $7.8 billion.
The difference between sale prices and assessments, according to Crain’s, was $9.2 billion. That’s equivalent to the cost of more than 40,000 median-priced Chicago-area homes.
Those billions in lower values resulted in higher tax bills for residents across Cook County.
Beyond Cook County
Low skyscraper assessments in Chicago also have an impact beyond Cook County. The more poor Chicago can make itself look, the more it gets in state education subsidies. And that means there’s less funding to go around for other more needy districts around the state.
On the flip side, communities in South Cook are disproportionately harmed. Their proportionally higher assessments mean that school districts in those communities get less state money than they otherwise would.
Simplicity and transparency
Cook County’s new Assessor, Fritz Kaegi, says he’s committed to reversing the corruption inherent in the assessment process. We’ll see how that turns out.
At the very least it’s going to be a messy few years as the relative value of assessments shift from South Cook to wealthier suburbs and from residential to commercial properties.
Whatever his methods, Kaegi’s end result has to be an assessment process and a property tax system that is more simple and transparent.
If Kaegi and other officials can’t accomplish that, then those willing to cheat the system will continue to find ways to push the nation’s highest property taxes onto ordinary Illinoisans.
Since Wall Street banks started re-entering the market for synthetic CDOs, securities that are remembered by some as one of the worst excesses of the pre-crisis era, the market for synthetic CDOs is booming once again, as the Financial Times reported on Friday.
But, before observers start squawking about how the rapid growth in both synthetic and traditional CDOs is a ‘sign of the top’, the banks and their risk managers would like you to hear them out: These products are much safer than their crisis-era counterparts, they say, in part because, this time around, they’re tied to corporate debt, instead of risky mortgage bonds.
Wall Street banks who are issuing the synthetic CDOs (a group that includes Citigroup, BNP Paribas and Société Générale while Barclays) insist that they are exercising “prudent risk controls” this time around. Meanwhile, hedge funds like Anchorage Capital Group and Fortress Investment Group who have muscled into the market for issuing CDOs, believe the business will prove profitable during the next downturn, Bloomberg reports.
Though the CDO market remains smaller than its rival CLO market, it grew last year for the first time since the financial crisis.
Risk managers for funds issuing CDOs and Wall Street banks expanding their synthetic business agree that the securities are much safer than their crisis-era analogues, in part because they’re tied to corporate bonds, a more stable market – at least in theory. Though some would disagree.
“It’s almost beyond belief that the very same people that claimed to be expert risk managers, who almost blew up the world in 2008, are back with the very same products,” said Dennis Kelleher, chief executive of advocacy group Better Markets.
And as far as synthetic CDOs are concerned, the stigma from the crisis has lingered.
“As soon as you think synthetic CDOs, you think of the financial crisis. It has taken investors some time to get over that,” said Peter Tchir, chief macro strategist at Academy Securities. “On a scale of one to 10, with one being very cautious and 10 being very aggressive, this is only around a five.”
In case you weren’t trading securities during the Bush era, or were simply too young to remember the financial crisis and the esoteric credit products that contributed to the near-collapse of the global financial system, here’s a quick explainer:
As buyers scramble for yield as credit spreads collapse, one can’t help but wonder…have we reached the point where savvy investors are willing to ‘short everything they touch’?
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2PJpK3g Tyler Durden
Many analysts believe a US-Israeli war on Iran and Lebanon is likely despite the lack of evidence of preparations for such a war. Although forces could be quickly mobilized after a political decision to go to war, all indications point to a non-military war situation for the simple reason that the US “strangulation war” is not costly to the US establishment and fits perfectly with the objectives of its main Middle Eastern ally, Israel. Nevertheless, menacing letters are being exchanged among involved parties who are, nonetheless, prepared for the worst-case scenario.
As far as Iran goes, the “zero oil exports” – the US wants to impose on the 1stof May – may be impossible to achieve. It will not be easy for OPEC members to compensate the two million Iranian barrels of oil daily (out of 3.45 million of total daily production), as President Donald Trump would like.
The Persian Gulf Star Co. gas refinery in Bandar Abbas, Iran, in January. Bloomberg via Getty Images
The US objective is to curb Iran’s will and force it to the negotiation table to dictate elements necessary for the security of Israel in the Middle East. A goal no US establishment has ever managed to achieve since the “Islamic Revolution” took power in Iran in 1979, notwithstanding the sanctions imposed over four decades.
Iran has land borders with Pakistan, Iraq and Turkey. It is logistically easy to supply these countries with Iran’s high-quality light crude oil at a cheaper price than the market price. During the Bush and Obama eras, Iran never stopped exporting its oil and exchanging it for hard currency or gold, despite sanctions.
Moreover, China needs its 650,000 bpd. Several Chinese companies offer technology and industrial services and commerce their expertise and products with Iranian companies in exchange for oil, and these companies are not willing to stop this trade. This alone will be enough to cause the failure of the US establishment’s objective of “zero exports” without necessarily meaning that such a breakdown will lead to a military confrontation.
President Trump is not willing to engage his forces in a major war, even if he has the audacity to ask Saudi Arabia to pay for it. The US President may have to find another achievement in the Middle East to brag about and exploit during the campaign for his second mandate in 2020.
This US administration, like previous ones, will likely fail to curb Iran’s will despite the severe sanctions it has imposed. Nor will it succeed in forcing Iran to stop support for its partners in the Middle East (i.e. Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Yemen). The support of Iran to state and non-state actors in the region is a self-imposed obligation cited in many articles in the Iranian constitution.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said diversifying Ankara’s oil sources in a short time “does not seem possible.”
Moreover, Iran will never agree to open its missile industry to inspection or to halt its missile production, as requested by the US establishment. Iran’s missiles represent its main efficient weapon to maintain a balance of forces sufficient to dissuade all its potential enemies.
And last, Iran and its Middle Eastern partners will not abandon the Palestinian cause until the last Palestinian group decides to abandon its territory to Israel. Therefore, Trump should be content – as the achievement of his first mandate – with the “gifts” he has given to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: Jerusalem and the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.
The bras-de-fer between the US and Iran will likely not wind down as long as Trump is in power, so long as he is unwilling meet Iran’s two conditions for the resumption of negotiations with Tehran: lifting the heavy sanctions imposed on Iran, and honoring the nuclear deal signed by his predecessor Barack Obama. Trump seems unable to accept the end of unilateral US hegemony over the world.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2UYe79J Tyler Durden
No, it doesn’t appear to be mere hyperbole, considering it’s the well-known neocon uber-hawk senator from South Carolina, who like the late John McCain would never waist precious opportunity to put the USA firmly on the war path.
Addressing recent reports that Cuba and Russia have sent troops to Venezuela to prop up embattled President Nicolas Maduro, Sen. Lindsey Graham angrily tweeted Friday, “Where is our aircraft carrier?”
“Cuba, Russia send troops to prop Maduro up in Venezuela…..while we talk/sanction,” Graham stated.
And he followed with, “Where is our aircraft carrier?”
A spokesperson for Graham later explained the tweet was designed to express support for a “show of force,” according to the Washington Examiner.
It’s worth pausing to keep in perspective that a sitting senator is now calling for an aircraft carrier to lead what he would no doubt desire to be a full scale invasion, regime change, and occupation of a country that has never attacked nor substantially threatened the United States — but of course it does have lots of oil and refuses to install a US puppet leader (in the form of Juan Guaido).
Cuba, Russia send troops to prop Maduro up in Venezuela…….while we talk/sanction.
Graham’s tweet was in response to national security adviser John Bolton’s latest somewhat dubious claim that between 20,000 to 25,000 Cuban soldiers have been sent to Venezuela to prop up Maduro, which Bolton offered as explanation for why this week’s Guaido-led coup attempt failed so miserably, barely even getting off the ground as it appears a mere handful of military members defected.
Some Congressional members have long accused Russia of interfering in Venezuelan affairs, for which apparently according to Graham’s logic, a US aircraft carrier deployment is warranted.
Also, POTUS now says #Russia not involved, which undercuts Lindsey Graham’s justification for aircraft carrier presence. https://t.co/flH3sLTU2S
Russia, however, says it’s only deployed dozens of “military specialists” to service preexisting military equipment contracts — an explanation which Trump appears to actually agree with, given that during a Friday phone call with Putin, Trump said the Russian president wants to see “something positive happen” for Venezuela, and further that Putin is not looking to get involved in the current crisis, according to CNN.
“He’s not looking at all to get involved in Venezuela,” declared Trump in reference to Putin following the phone call in front of White House reporters.
Trump’s Friday afternoon statement denying Russian interference in the Latin American oil-rich but cash-strapped country also undercut his own national security adviser, given Bolton forcefully asserted Wednesday in an interview with Fox News that“We are not going to see the Russians take over a country in the Western Hemisphere.”
Had a long and very good conversation with President Putin of Russia. As I have always said, long before the Witch Hunt started, getting along with Russia, China, and everyone is a good thing, not a bad thing….
Bolton accused Russia and Cuba of conspiring to secretly deploy troops to Venezuela in order to prevent so-called “legitimate Interim President” Guaido from “rightfully” taking power as head over the Venezuelan military.
But given Trump’s apparently positive “very productive talk” with Putin, it certainly doesn’t appear Graham will get his desired aircraft carrier deployment or even heightened US troop readiness to the Venezuelan Caribbean anytime soon.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2Lme9bQ Tyler Durden
