By Andre Brochu

Krugman is always good at peddling his snake oil.

There is no Scandinavian socialism and the universal welfare states in Sweden and
Denmark are at the morgue waiting for the coroners to go to work.
If you live in Scandinavia you can wonder about Krugman’s sources of data and analysis. There is more substance in good SciFi.

Any degree of Keynesianism to promote employment and public investment has
been reduced drastically since the Social Democrats joined the bourgeois parties
in promoting membership and integration in the EU. The false promise of a Social
EU has proven to be a lie before and after the last crisis. The EU is a neoliberal
project since its infancy with the Treaty of Rome. The so-called freedoms are for capital
and finance. Some people from the establishment have woken up. However, it is a little
late. Rightwing xenophobic populists have reaped a bumper crop of voters in the lastest EU
elections since their false but down to earth arguments and propaganda have
convinced many of the unemployed, frustrated and scared electorate. The Social Democrats
and the parliamentary left don’t address economically or ideologically the problems
of the unemployed, underemployed, and youth who face at best job insecurity and
an inability even when working to gain basic social benefits.

The late Peter Cohen wrote cogently on what was developing in Scandinavia
twenty years ago in an article in Monthly Review which is still relevant :
Sweden: The Model That Never Was by Peter Cohen
1994, July-August, Volume 46, Monthly Review
This article is essential to any analysis and debunking of Krugman’s mythology.

Before the referendum for Sweden’s EU membership in 1994 the CEO of Volvo Per
Gyllenhammar delineated the goal of the EEC/EU : long-term low wage increases,
reduced taxation, dismantling of the public sector and reduced welfare benefits.
The Swedish Rockefeller, Peter Wallenberg, said that an EEC/EU membership would result in the most dramatic changes in Sweden in the last hundred years. He drew the same conclusions as Gyllenhammar adding that public services would be privatized to a great degree. Today we have an underfinanced public sector with dire consequences for public health, employment, education, housing and infrastructure.

In conclusion there is at least a burgeoning protest movement against the EU-USA Free Trade Treaty (TTIP/TAFTA) throughout the EU. There should be Transatlantic cooperation on this
issue.

Krugman is part of the problem and not part of the solution. Let him sleep on like Rip Van
Winkle.

http://rt.com/op-edge/161712-ukraine-new-president-opposition-talks/

Published time: May 27, 2014 15:19

Ukraine’s new President Poroshenko says the “anti-terrorist operation” needs to be stepped up and needs to be “more efficient” which means more violence and resistance until there is decisive victory, political analyst Daniel Patrick Welch told RT.

RT: On the day of his election victory, Petro Poroshenko said he wants negotiations with the east… but that the military operation needs to be stepped up… Isn’t he contradicting himself?

Daniel Patrick Welch: He has no interest in that. He is lying, he is not contradicting himself. He has absolutely no intention of conducting negotiations, and he has said so in various others forms. He said that the operation needs to be stepped up and needs to be what he called “more efficient”. And we see what it means today, that means involving shelling against civilians, bombs that fall through the air, occupied apartment blocks, fighter jets and helicopter gunships and grenade launchers against urban populations.

RT: We are now seeing intense fighting in the east of Ukraine. Given the incoming president’s position – are we going to see more bloodshed?

DW: Yes, there already has been shelling at the Donetsk airport on Tuesday, which was followed by the RPG attack on a truck evacuating the wounded, in which it is reported to be 35 dead and 50, wounded, according to self-defense sources. It is a huge ramp up, and it is a very scary thing. Remember that he [Poroshenko] refers to all of them as terrorists. Just a couple of weeks ago when we had the referendum in the east, you had an enormous, overwhelming majority of people voting. So what they are saying now is that the entire population of the east oblast are in fact terrorists or as the more radical, the Right Sector and “Svoboda”, call them “kolorady”, Colorado beetles – insects. People are insects and what you do with insects is that you stamp on them and that is the only thing they have in store for these people. It is a very dangerous and scary development, a huge escalation.

RT: Why the West is ok with the way elections were held and with a new president who wants to continue military action against his own people?

DW: They put this puppet in control, Willy Wonka as the Ukrainians have taken to calling him; Chocolate King, in control in a farcical election in order just to provide a fig leaf to what they have been planning all along which is Zbigniew Brzezinski’s plan to scare and encircle Russia. Doing it through killing large numbers of people in southeast Ukraine does not bother them at all.

RT: Kiev describes its actions in the east as an anti-terror operation. So how can they justify the air assault on Donetsk Airport on Monday, where there were civilian casualties?

DW: I do not know. Even though I was expecting it, I was shocked by the brutality and ruthlessness that came to life. Actually, what happened while the election was going on, while the farce has been played out, there were people shelling Slavyansk on Monday, not just on Tuesday. This is going to further escalate unless and until the fascists are stopped. The only trouble is that whether there are negotiations or not they do not want any negotiations. And what the people of the east, and not just in the east, there was an attack in Carpathian Ruthenia against the Right Sector’s block post as well. So this is oligarch returning despite all that [has been] made and promised, and you are going to have further resistance until there is a decisive victory. There has to be some help from outside and a much broader mobilization of Donbas because they have ruthless people against them.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

Neil Clark is a journalist, writer and broadcaster. His award winning blog can be found at www.neilclark66.blogspot.com . Follow him on Twitter

Published time: May 20, 2014 11:28

Just imagine if the democratically-elected government of Canada had been toppled in a Russian-financed coup, in which far-right extremists and neo-Nazis played a prominent role.
That the new unelected ‘government’ in Ottawa cancelled the law giving the French language official status, appointed a billionaire oligarch to run Quebec and signed an association agreement with a Russian-led trade bloc.

Just imagine…

If Russia had spent $5 billion on regime change in Canada and then a leading Canadian energy firm had appointed to its board of directors the son of a top Russian government politician.

Just imagine…

If the Syrian government had hosted a meeting in Damascus of the ‘Friends of Britain’- a group of countries who supported the violent overthrow of David Cameron’s government.

That the Syrian government and its allies gave the anti-government ‘rebels’ in Britain millions of pounds and other support, and failed to condemn ‘rebel’ groups when they killed British civilians and bombed schools, hospitals and universities.

That the Syrian Foreign Minister dismissed next year’s scheduled general election in the UK as a ‘parody of democracy’ and said that Cameron must stand down before any elections are held.

Just imagine…

If in 2003, Russia and its closest allies had launched a full-scale military invasion of an oil-rich country in the Middle East, having claimed that that country possessed WMDs which threatened the world and that afterwards no WMDs were ever found.

That up to 1 million people had been killed in the bloodshed that followed the invasion and that the country was still in turmoil over 10 years later.

That Russian companies had come in to benefit from the reconstruction and rebuilding work following the ‘regime change’.

Just imagine…

If the pro-Russian journalists who had faithfully parroted the claims that the Middle Eastern country that Russia had invaded in 2003 had WMDs did not apologise afterwards or show any contrition despite the enormous death toll; but instead carried on in their well-paid jobs to propagandize more illegal wars and ’interventions’ against other independent countries, and attacked those honest journalists who didn’t peddle the war lies.

Just imagine…

If over forty people protesting against the central government had been burnt to death by pro-government extremists in Venezuela.

That the Venezuelan government had launched a military offensive against people protesting for greater autonomy/federalization following visits by the head of the Russian SVR and Dmitry Medvedev to Caracas.

Just imagine….

If last August over six hundred people protesting in camps against the government in Minsk in Belarus had been massacred by armed forces. That this spring, the courts in Belarus had handed out death sentences to over 600 supporters of opposition parties.

Just imagine….

If Russia had spent the years following the end of the old ‘Cold War’ surrounding the US with military bases and pushing for Canada and Mexico to join a Russian military alliance. That earlier this month Russia carried out major military exercises in Mexico.

Just imagine….

If we had heard leaked telephone calls between a high ranking official from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Russian Ambassador in Canada in which they discussed who should/shouldn’t be in the Canadian government. That their approved candidate subsequently became the new, unelected Prime Minister following a Russian-financed ‘regime change’.

That the high ranking Russian official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also said : ‘Fxxx the EU’.

Just imagine…

If the Syrian air force had bombed a weapons depot in Israel and also bombed convoys which security officials said were carrying weapons to anti-government forces in Syria.

Just imagine…

If leading Russian politicians attended anti-austerity street protests in western Europe, handed out cookies to those protesting, and supported the protestors’ calls for the governments to step down.
Imagining what would happen if any of the above events occurred, and comparing it to what has happened in reality is highly instructive as it shows us what is wrong with the world today.
Actions have been taken by the US and its allies which would be considered totally outrageous if carried out by other countries. All we have to do is to switch the names of the countries concerned to see the double standards.

If Russia had attacked an oil-rich Middle Eastern nation in 2003, and pro-Russian journalists peddled the same sort of deceitful pro-war, WMD propaganda that neocons and faux-leftists did in the west when the US invaded Iraq, then we can be sure that Russia would have been regarded as an international pariah, and the journalists who acted as cheerleaders for the illegal invasion would be discredited for the rest of their lives. But the US is not subject to sanctions or treated as an outcast, its President in 2003, George W. Bush and his close ally Tony Blair, have yet to stand trial for war crimes, and the media ‘pundits’ who supported the invasion of Iraq are still in place and now pushing for a new Cold war against Russia and new military ‘intervention’ against Syria.

If Russia had spent $5bn on toppling the democratically-elected government of either Canada or Mexico, and installed a pro-Russian junta in its place, we can be sure that within hours, a full scale military invasion by the US would have taken place, in order to remove the new ‘government’ from power. Western television news channels and elite pundits would be enthusiastically supporting the US action – declaring it to be a ‘response to Russian aggression’ and saying it was totally justified. But when the regime changing was done by the US in Ukraine, and a pro-US junta installed in power in Kiev, it’s a very different story. The same people who would cry ‘foul’ at the top of their voices if Russia engineered a coup in Canada or Mexico, celebrate the unlawful toppling of the legitimate government of Ukraine.

We already know how the US would respond, if another country sought to put nuclear weapons close to its territory – in 1962 the world came to the brink of war in the Cuban missile crisis. But while a third world war would undoubtedly be threatened again if Russian forces held military exercises in Mexico, it’s not considered provocative for NATO to hold military exercises in Estonia.

If the governments of Belarus and Venezuela had responded as brutally towards anti-government protesters as the Egyptian military regime did last August, or sent in the tanks and used heavy weaponry against their own people as the western-backed Kiev junta has, then we can be sure that the great ‘humanitarians’ of the faux-left would be screeching not just for punitive sanctions but for air strikes too and for Presidents Lukashenko and Maduro to be carted off to The Hague.

We all know too what would have followed if it had been the Syrian air force that had bombed a weapons depot and convoys in Israel and not the other way round. Why do we tolerate such brazen hypocrisy?

There is no legal or moral basis for saying that the US and its allies should be able to do things, which if done by other countries, would be condemned as wrong and punished with the imposition of sanctions and/or military attack or invasion. International law and the principles of non-interference in other nations should apply equally to all: regardless of the country’s political system or form of government. The British government has no more right to interfere in the internal affairs of Syria than the Syrian government has to interfere in the internal affairs of Great Britain. The US has no more right to ‘regime change’ in countries bordering Russia, than Russia has to ‘regime change’ in countries bordering the US.

We need a new international order based on the equality of all sovereign nations: a new “World of Equals”, as envisaged by this year’s Belgrade Forum, whose declaration can be read here. If we can imagine that and work to put it in place by exposing current western hypocrisy and double standards whenever they occur then the world would be a much safer place.

May 24, 2014

http://consortiumnews.com/2014/05/24/the-state-departments-ukraine-fiasco/

Exclusive: The State Department’s handling of the Ukraine crisis may go down as a textbook diplomatic fiasco, doing nothing to advance genuine U.S. interests while disrupting cooperation with Moscow and pushing Russia and China back together, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

American diplomacy, by definition, is supposed to advance the national interests of the United States, not contribute to international crises that undermine those interests. Yet, by that standard, the U.S. State Department and Secretary of State John Kerry have failed extraordinarily during the current Ukraine crisis.

Besides ripping Ukraine apart – and getting scores of Ukrainians killed – the U.S.-supported coup in February has injected more uncertainty into Europe’s economy by raising doubts about the continued supply of Russian natural gas. Such turbulence is the last thing that Europe’s fragile “recovery” needs as mass unemployment now propels the rise of right-wing parties and threatens the future of the European Union.

Any new business downturn in Europe also would inflict harm on the U.S. economy, which itself is still clawing its way out of a long recession and needs a healthy Europe as an important trading partner. But the crisis in Ukraine, spurred on by Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland and other anti-Russian hardliners, is now complicating the U.S. recovery, too.

There’s also the problematic impact of pulling Ukraine out of Russia’s orbit and locking it into Europe’s: the scheme would shift the financial burden for Ukraine’s impoverished population of 45 million people onto Europe’s back, even as the EU is straining to meet the human needs of the jobless in Greece, Spain and other countries devastated by the Great Recession.

One of Ukraine’s principal exports to Europe has been low-wage Ukrainian workers, including participants in the criminal underworld, most notably prostitution. The willingness of Ukrainians to take the lowest-paying jobs across Europe has exacerbated the Continent’s unemployment situation and is sure to become an even bigger problem if a bankrupt Ukraine is more fully integrated into Europe.

Plus, the State Department’s endless stoking of tensions between President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin has caused other complications for U.S. foreign policy, including what is emerging as a historic rapprochement between China and Russia, a coming together highlighted by the signing of a major new gas deal on Wednesday.

The $400 billion pact means that Putin, in effect, has countered U.S. efforts to use limited U.S./EU sanctions to isolate Russia by deftly playing the China card and aligning the two emerging countries as an economic and political counterforce to American dominance.

Though the natural gas deal has been in the works for months, the Ukraine crisis provided the urgency to get the agreement signed. The crisis also provided the impetus to solidify the closer geopolitical bonding between China, the world’s ascending economy, and Russia, its resource-rich neighbor.

The two longtime adversaries, who faced off as communist rivals during the Cold War, have joined together recently as a bloc on the United Nations Security Council to block Western initiatives on Syria, for instance. That means that instead of isolating Russia at the UN, the State Department’s hawkish approach to Ukraine has had the opposite effect. Russia now has a new and powerful ally.

The Ukraine crisis could inflict other collateral damage on President Obama’s initiatives toward resolving thorny disputes around Syria’s civil war and Iran’s nuclear program. In both areas, President Putin provided important assistance to President Obama in securing agreements: Syria to surrender its chemical weapons and Iran to accept constraints on its nuclear activity.

Though the Russians have not pulled out of those U.S. collaborations yet, the strains over Ukraine – if they are not eased – could undermine valuable cooperation toward reaching resolution of those two complicated and dangerous Mideast problems.

Pouring Fuel in the Fire

Yet, even as President Putin and other Russian leaders have tempered their rhetoric regarding Ukraine in recent weeks, the U.S. State Department continues to talk tough, bombarding Putin with both warnings and insults.

Typical were the comments in the lead story of the Washington Post on Saturday with writer Karen DeYoung quoting State Department and other U.S. officials berating Putin despite his conciliatory remarks about his willingness to work with the new Ukrainian government that will emerge from a disputed election on Sunday.

She wrote: “Western governments express deep uncertainty at what Russia will do, and it was symptomatic of their equally deep mistrust of Putin that few took him at his word [about working with the new government]. U.S. officials parsed his language as leaving a hole big enough to drive a brigade of Russian soldiers through.”

The Post quoted the harsh rhetoric emanating from State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf, who told the Russians: “Pull the rest of your troops back. … Put your money where your words are. Come on.”

DeYoung herself termed the Russian military deployment along Ukraine’s eastern border “threatening,” but didn’t mention the Russian rationale for the initial deployment, as an effort to deter the slaughter of ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine who objected to the violent overthrow of their elected President Viktor Yanukovych. This context of what’s happening in eastern Ukraine is almost always missing.

Instead, the major U.S. news media, particularly the New York Times, has made great fun by mocking Putin as a liar for saying that, first, he had ordered Russian troops to pull back from the border, and then that he ordered some to return to their bases. The Times conflated these two different statements as one and then favorably quoted NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen as saying there was no evidence of a Russian pullback. Gotcha, another Putin lie!

Yet, while showing their trust in Rasmussen’s honesty and forthrightness, the Times and other mainstream outlets haven’t bothered to inform their readers that this was the same Anders Fogh Rasmussen who as Danish prime minister last decade was a staunch supporter of the Iraq War and a gullible believer in President George W. Bush’s claims about Iraq’s non-existent WMD.

For instance, Prime Minister Rasmussen declared, “Iraq has WMDs. It is not something we think, it is something we know. Iraq has itself admitted that it has had mustard gas, nerve gas, anthrax, but Saddam won’t disclose. He won’t tell us where and how these weapons have been destroyed. We know this from the UN inspectors, so there is no doubt in my mind.”

Pretty much everything in that statement was wrong — and Rasmussen appears to have been wrong, too, about Russia’s pullback of troops, which has now been confirmed, at least in part, by the Pentagon. But, for days, the Times let Rasmussen, in effect, call Putin a liar without any independent checking, just one more sign of the long pattern of U.S. media bias against Russia during the Ukraine crisis. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Twisting Putin’s Words on Ukraine.”]

Blaming Russia

In line with that bias pervading the mainstream U.S. media for months, the Post’s DeYoung added her own inflammatory rhetoric, stating “if Russian-inspired violence breaks out, it could be the start of far more serious and widespread international upheaval.” All violence, it seems, must be “Russian-inspired.”

DeYoung is presumably referring to the resistance in eastern Ukraine against the imposition of the coup regime’s authority. The U.S. media has repeatedly treated these ethnic Russians in the east as Putin’s “minions,” being armed and directed by Russian special forces although no evidence has emerged to support that allegation.[See Consortiumnews.com’s “NYT Retracts Russian-Photo Scoop.”]

But DeYoung’s characterization of “Russian-inspired violence” fits with Official Washington’s “group think” that has treated the Ukraine crisis as instigated by Putin supposedly so he can begin reclaiming territory lost when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

But the evidence clearly indicates that the uprising in Kiev was driven by a mix of popular dissatisfaction with Yanukovych, Western support and encouragement for the disorders, and violent neo-Nazi militias that despise the ethnic Russians in the east and spearheaded the Feb. 22 putsch that drove Yanukovych from office.

Still, the U.S. mainstream media has insisted on whitewashing the neo-Nazis brown shirts because their key involvement complicates the preferred American narrative of white-hat idealistic protesters taking on black-hat Yanukovych, backed by even blacker-hat Putin. Any reference to the well-documented role of neo-Nazis militias in the putsch is dismissed as “Russian propaganda” or the “Russian narrative.” [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Ukraine’s Inconvenient Neo-Nazis.”]

So, instead of a balanced account, the American people have been fed Official Washington’s “group think” of some master conspiracy engineered by Putin that requires your believing that Putin first orchestrated the EU’s reckless association offer to Ukraine last year, then got the International Monetary Fund to insist on draconian austerity measures which Yanukovych rejected, then arranged the angry demonstrations at the Maidan while also secretly training neo-Nazi militias in western Ukraine to provide the muscle to carry out the February putsch – all the while pretending that he was trying to save Yanukovych’s government and appearing to be distracted by the Winter Olympics in Sochi.

Of course, this grand conspiracy theory never made any sense and also lacked any evidence. What really happened was that neoconservatives in and around the State Department and Congress fed the flames of western Ukraine’s discontent against Yanukovych’s government that had been elected primarily with votes from the southern and eastern ethnic Russian sections.

The Neocon Role

There were, of course, legitimate complaints about Ukraine’s pervasive political corruption, which has been an endemic problem since the hasty privatization that followed the Soviet collapse in 1991 and turned Ukraine into a country dominated by a handful of extremely wealthy oligarchs.

But the evidence is clear that powerful neoconservatives in Washington, including some still ensconced at the State Department, helped organize U.S. support for the protests that led to Yanukovych’s ouster.

In late September, the neocons were furious over Putin helping Obama find a way out of an impending U.S. attack on Syria, an intervention that the neocons hoped might notch another “regime change” on their belts. So, their focus quickly turned to driving a wedge between the two leaders, with Ukraine becoming that wedge.

Carl Gershman, a leading neocon and longtime president of the U.S.-funded National Endowment for Democracy, took to the op-ed page of the neocon-flagship Washington Post to urge the U.S. government to push European “free trade” agreements on Ukraine and other former Soviet states and thus counter Moscow’s efforts to maintain close relations with those countries.

The ultimate goal, according to Gershman, was isolating and possibly toppling Putin in Russia with Ukraine the key piece on this global chessboard. “Ukraine is the biggest prize,” Gershman wrote. “Russians, too, face a choice, and Putin may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad but within Russia itself.”

In furtherance of these goals, NED funded scores of projects in Ukraine, training activists, financing “journalists” and organizing business groups, according to NED’s annual report.

After Yanukovych rejected the IMF’s terms for European association as too drastic – because they would hit the already hard-hit Ukrainian people even harder – his removal from power became the State Department’s goal, as Assistant of State Nuland urged on the demonstrators in the Maidan by passing out cookies and reminded Ukrainian business leaders that the United States had invested $5 billion in their “European aspirations.”

Sen. John McCain, a leading neocon hawk, also showed up in Kiev to rally the protesters, speaking next to a Svoboda party banner honoring World War II Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera whose paramilitary force helped exterminate Jews and Poles. Bandera is a hero to the right-wing nationalists in western Ukraine though despised by the ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine.

In an intercepted phone call, Nuland was caught telling U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt that her preference to replace Yanukovych was Arseniy Yatsenyuk, whom she called “Yats.” After the Feb. 22 coup, Yatsenyuk emerged as the new prime minister with the neo-Nazis gaining control of four ministries, including the office of national security headed by neo-Nazi Andriy Parubiy. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Ukraine, Through the US ‘Looking Glass’.”]

One of Yatsenyuk’s first moves was to approve the IMF austerity plan, while Parubiy incorporated some of the neo-Nazi militias into the National Guard and dispatched them as storm troopers to confront the resistance to the coup regime in the east.

Amid all the political chaos and violations of the Ukrainian constitution (which was ignored in the abrupt impeachment of Yanukovych), Crimea arranged a hasty referendum which showed some 96 percent support for seceding from Ukraine and rejoining Russia, a request that Putin and the Russian government accepted.

Typically, the New York Times and other major outlets summarize the Crimean switch as a Russian “invasion” with Putin supposedly dispatching troops to seize control of the peninsula with the help of a “sham” referendum.

Almost never does the U.S. press note that the Russian troops were already in Crimea under an arrangement with Ukraine allowing Russians to maintain their historic naval base at Sevastapol. The vote also clearly reflected the popular will of the Crimean people given their historic ties to Russia and the chaos in Ukraine.

Medvedev’s Comments

“We did not annex any part of Ukraine,” Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev told Bloomberg News this past week, “The population of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea held a referendum and voted for self-determination and for joining Russia in accordance with the existing procedure. And that’s what they did.

“They started by proclaiming independence and after that, they asked to join Russia. We satisfied their request. The Russian Constitution was amended so that Crimea could join Russia as the result of a popular vote. Crimea is a special and unique story.” That was a reference to Crimea being a longtime part of Russia.

Regarding any other parts of Ukraine, Medvedev added, “Any conjectures about Russia wanting to annex some territories are mere propaganda. … It is essential to calm tensions in Ukraine. We all see what’s happening there: the situation is nothing short of a civil war, as a matter of fact. This is what we should all be thinking about.”

Pressed by Bloomberg’s Ryan Chilcote on guaranteeing that Russia would not accede to requests from Ukrainian separatists in eastern Ukraine, Medvedev responded, “we (I’m referring to all those who sympathize with Ukraine – European countries and as far as I understand, the United States and, of course, Russia, which is the closest to Ukraine) should do all we can to de-escalate tensions – a measure that everyone is talking about now.

“In other words, we should do everything to stop the spread of civil war on Ukrainian territory. As for the positions of people in Lugansk, Donetsk and other [eastern] parts of Ukraine, our stance is simple – their positions deserve respect. If they hold some referendums, we should understand what they want and why they express such views.

“So in the future, the main point is to make sure that Ukraine’s central, de facto authorities and those who live in these parts of Ukraine establish a fully-fledged dialogue based on mutual respect and understanding, a dialogue that takes into account the position of eastern Ukraine. This would ease tensions; otherwise the conflict will continue, and we will most likely hear the same appeals [for secession] that were discussed at the referendums.”

Medvedev added: “Let our partners in the dialogue, namely the EU and the United States, guarantee us something, for example, that they won’t interfere in Ukraine’s internal affairs. Let our Western partners guarantee us that they won’t lure Ukraine into NATO, that the Russian language won’t be prohibited in eastern Ukraine, and that some senseless movement such as the Right Sector won’t start killing people there. Let our partners guarantee this.”

The key Ukraine question now is: Can Putin and Obama overcome Official Washington’s chest-thumping hysteria and deescalate the violence — along with the rhetoric — for the good of all rational parties in the dispute?

I’m told that Putin, though stung by Obama initially joining the anti-Russian stampede, has begun working again with Obama with the goal of a possible summit meeting in Normandy on June 6 during the ceremonies honoring the 70th anniversary of D-Day.

Yet, even if the pieces of a shattered Ukraine can be glued back together, one still has to wonder why the U.S. State Department and other parts of Official Washington undertook this provocative project in the first place: contributing to the overthrow of Ukraine’s elected government, violently destabilizing the country, heightening tensions with Russia, stirring up new threats to the EU and U.S. economies, and pushing Russia and China back together.

It may be understandable at some level that the still-powerful neocons saw the Ukraine wedge as a useful tool in splintering the Putin-Obama cooperation that had eased tensions over Syria and Iran – two of the neocons’ top targets for “regime change” – but it remains a mystery how anyone could think that the Ukraine adventure has served U.S. national interests.

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his new book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).

http://www.cpusa.org/cpusa-sends-protest-letter-to-president-obama-on-ukraine/

The following is a letter of protest to President Barack Obama from the Communist Party USA regarding the political and violent attacks in the Ukraine by the Right Sector against the Communist Party of the Ukraine, the Ukrainian Jewish communities and other minorities and progressives.

May 14, 2014

Dear President Barack Obama,

We write to you because of our grave concern over recent events in the Ukraine. On May 2, reports state, 1,000 extreme right-wing thugs attacked their fellow Ukrainian citizens in Odessa, setting fire to a union hall to which many had fled. At least 40 people perished in the blaze. A few days later on May 6, members of parliament from the Communist Party of the Ukraine – a party that had won 32 seats in Ukraine’s Rada (federal parliament) in the 2012 election – were banned from the legislative chamber, according to news reports. Under the leadership of the Right Sector, the drive to outlaw the Communist Party and “communist ideology” is underway with a push for legislation that would implement such anti-democratic measures.

This comes on the heels of anti-Semitic attacks on Jewish Ukrainians and synagogues, attacks on other minorities, and attacks on the central office of the Communist Party in Kiev, which was ransacked and burned, and on regional Communist leaders and activists. The list of outrages could go on.

U.S. policy in the Ukraine purports to uphold democracy, yet reports in the German publication Bild indicate that FBI and CIA operatives are active with Ukrainian “security” forces, including these far right wing forces. How is it democratic to purge a legitimately elected party from parliament? How is it democratic to violently target Communists and others in the Ukraine who disagree with the direction of the right-wing-led acting government? Besides violating the basic premise of national sovereignty, U.S. policy is aiding and abetting the most violent and reactionary forces to grab power all in the name of fighting the Russians.

The United States has its own sordid anti-democratic history of banning the Communist Party and conducting witch hunts against Communists and any person suspected of holding left-wing and progressive political views. During the Cold War McCarthy era people went to jail for the simple act of thinking these thoughts – in the legal terminology it was called “conspiracy to teach.” The persecution of left and progressive people during this period has been widely considered a deep stain on the democratic ideals of freedom of speech and freedom of association.

The Communist Party of the Ukraine is a legitimate political party that represents a constituency in that country. The chair of the party is a candidate for president in the U.S.-supported May 25 elections. The party advocates for keeping the Ukraine’s territorial integrity through “the widest possible dialogue between all political forces” and offers a program of “federalization and increase[ing] the powers” of the country’s regional governments as a way to end the current crisis and move forward. The Communist Party of the Ukraine also opposes the “oppressive role of foreign intervention” that includes Russia as well as the United States and any other outside actor.

We urge that your administration take immediate steps to communicate to the Right Sector, Svoboda and their allies that their violent and anti-democratic actions will not be supported by the United States. In fact, the United States government, and individual U.S. politicians and officials, should cease to associate themselves with such elements.

The Communist Party USA, in numerous statements and articles, has said that the overall present U.S. policy in Ukraine is detrimental to the interests of the peoples of Ukraine, Russia and Europe, as well as the United States, as this policy has increased instability and violence that could very easily spiral out of control. The current policy and anti-Russia narrative is reminiscent of the Cold War. We recognize and oppose Putin’s strong-arm tactics in the dispute over Crimea and appeals to reactionary nationalism, but the onus of rectifying this dangerous situation remains on your administration. Russia responded to a provocative policy hatched and executed in Washington, namely the encirclement of the country’s western borders by NATO.

The atrocious incident in Odessa was a predictable result of this policy of turning a blind eye to the active fascist presence in Ukraine. The Communist Party USA expresses its outrage at this incident and its solidarity with the families and friends of the victims of this atrocity.

The CPUSA will continue to work for peace in the Ukraine and express its total solidarity with the Communist Party of the Ukraine, with the Ukrainian Jewish community and with all others who are endangered by the extremist upsurge.

On behalf of the National Board of the CPUSA,

Sam Webb

CPUSA chair

http://mltoday.com/how-much-longer-obama-and-the-cuban-five?utm

by Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada

May 15, 2014

The arrest in Cuba of four Miami residents who came with the aim of carrying out terrorist acts here that were planned there — where they received training, resources and where their bosses are — brings to light once again the absolute injustice committed against our Five compatriots. They were conducting a difficult and risky mission precisely to try to prevent similar crimes.

The heroic task of Gerardo, Ramón, Antonio, Fernando and René was perfectly legitimate. It was based on what is known as “state of necessity” or otherwise known as “necessity defense.” In certain circumstances, to save lives that are in danger a person can commit lesser violations (forcing entry into a home without asking permission and causing material damage in order to rescue someone from a fire, is an easy example to understand).

In this case, to save other lives, they put their own lives in danger, and not just in one heroic act — as in the example of the house on fire — but rather in many heroic acts in the years that they worked inside the worst terrorist groups, in order to discover their plans. They never used arms nor used force or violence. In their daily lives they obeyed the law and their social duties. They were models of civility as their neighbors and co-workers testified in their trial.

Our compatriots technically committed only one fault: they didn’t reveal to authorities the nature of their mission in Miami. That violation of not having registered as a foreign agent is quite common in the United States and it is normally resolved with payment of a fine.

In the case of the Cuban Five that omission is also completely justified. In fact, it was essential. Why would someone struggle against Miami terrorism and at the same time notify the very same authorities who have helped and supported the terrorists for 50 years?

The very trial they were subjected to proves that point to the hilt. From the initial indictments to the sessions where their excessive sentences were imposed and throughout the trial, the prosecutors never hid the fact that they were on the side of the terrorists, that they were their protectors, and to support them they placed our heroes in the docket of the accused in a bizarre subversion of justice.

The judge, for her part, had her own unforgettable moments, which exposed the true essence of what was occurring. This was especially true when she imposed their sentences, which included, at the request of the Government, the so-called “incapacitation clause”, subjecting the defendants to a special regimen — after they were to complete their exaggerated prison terms — that the Prosecution considered “perhaps more important” than the unjust imprisonment.

It had to do with preventing that never again any of the Cuban Five could attempt anything against the terrorists.

Since René and Antonio were U.S. citizens by birth and could not be expelled immediately from the country, as Fernando was recently, they added several years of “probation” with strict conditions that included this very telling one: “As a further special condition of supervised release the defendant is prohibited from associating with or visiting specific places where individuals or groups such as terrorists, members of organizations advocating violence, and organized crime figures are known to be or frequent.”

This outrageous order was issued in December 2001. In those days W. Bush proclaimed that “any government that supports, protects or harbors terrorists is complicit in the murder of the innocent and equally guilty of terrorist crimes” and motivated by that idea he unleashed everywhere his “war against terrorism.” Wherever it may be, although for Bush obviously Miami is on another planet.

The judge’s clause to protect the terrorists is the very essence of the whole saga of the Five. It is enough to read the order issued by the same judge, 10 years later, when René left the prison. She wanted to force him to remain there, alone, isolated, unarmed, without the possibility of defending himself against any aggression. As if that weren’t enough the judge repeated, word for word, the prohibition given 10 years before. The warning was very clear: They were not going protect René from the terrorists, but rather protect them from René.

Today, like yesterday, the United States government clearly recognizes that they know who the terrorists are in Miami. They also know where they are and what places they frequent. But it also shows, shamefully, that the “Bush doctrine” doesn’t apply to them, and instead of capturing and sending them to jail, it dedicates its efforts to protect them.

That’s why it surprised no one when in 2005 Luis Posada Carriles — wanted for 20 years by Interpol, fugitive from Venezuelan justice who was being tried for the destruction of a civilian airliner in mid-flight in 1976 —decided to install himself in Miami and continue promoting terrorism against Cuba, and no longer while underground, but out in the open.

It was also no surprise that four members of Posada’s terrorist network have come to Cuba several times to prepare new attacks and are now in prison here. They are individuals with a criminal record in Miami, and have even boasted publicly about their criminal intentions.

The impunity with which these criminal groups continue to operate is a direct consequence of the process pursued against our Five comrades. What happened more than 15 years ago was a clear message still in effect: in Miami not only is terrorism against Cuba permitted, but also benefits with the complicity and protection of the authorities.

The conversion of southern Florida to a sanctuary for terrorism can also be a dangerous game for the people of the United States. While the Cuban Five were imprisoned and the infamous trial was conducted against them, the majority of the terrorists who carried out the atrocity on Sept. 11, 2001 were training right there in Miami. None of them raised suspicions; none of them drew the interest of the FBI. Because in Miami, the FBI has no time for those things since they dedicate their all to protect the anti-Cuban terrorism and to punish those who try to prevent their crimes.

Barack Obama is approaching the mid-term of his second and last period as President. When he entered the White House in 2009 he received an immoral and hypocritical conduct he is not responsible for. But he will be if he does nothing to change it.

In his hands is the power to do something so he is remembered as someone different from his predecessor. The first thing would be to grant immediate and unconditional freedom to Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, Ramón Labañino and Antonio Guerrero. He can do it and he knows it. He also knows that if he doesn’t do it, history will not forgive him.

Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada has served as Cuba’s UN ambassador, Foreign Minister and president of the National Assembly.

http://realcuba.wordpress.com/

by: W. T. Whitney Jr.

May 15 2014 People’s World

Beginning over 50 years ago, terror attacks emanating from the United States struck ships, crops, and infrastructure in Cuba. They killed people there and around the world. Cuban leaders faced murder plots. Terrorists bombed an airliner fully loaded with passengers. Such murderous, destructive attacks seemed to stop, however, with the Havana hotel bombings in 1997. But you would have lost your bet that terrorist preparations had ended.
On May 7 Cuba’s Interior Ministry announced that four men of Cuban origin living in Miami were arrested on April 26. Jose Ortega Amador, Obdulio Rodríguez González, Raibel Pacheco Santos, and Félix Monzón Álvarez reportedly “admitted that they intended to attack Cuban military facilities in order to promote violence. [T]hree of them had traveled to Cuba in several occasions in 2013 to study the scene and prepare their actions.”

Why is this no surprise? One, the Miami area continues as a safe haven for Latin American terror perpetrators fleeing their homelands, Cuba in the lead with Venezuela not far behind. Secondly, the U.S. government, not shy about anti-terrorist rhetoric, never really has condemned terror assaults against Cuba. Third, U.S. government actions or inaction may signal official approval for anti-Cuban terror.

Thus Luis Posada entered the United States illegally in 2005, never to be convicted on that count, or for serious crimes, among them: the airliner bombing attack in 1976, Cuban hotel bombings, and his plan with others to assassinate former Cuban President Fidel Castro in Panama. Despite requests, the U. S. government refuses to extradite Posada to Venezuela to face legal proceedings related to the airliner bombing.

And in 1998 the Cuban government gave FBI personnel reams of incriminating material on terror activities in Florida. The FBI responded by arresting Cuban undercover agents who helped collect that intelligence information.

And at their trial in Miami, five of those anti-terrorist agents – now known as the Cuba Five- received sentences so outlandish as to suggest that some terrorism is allowable. Their combined total of four life sentences plus 75 years contrasts sharply with the usual 10-15 sentences handed out to defendants convicted of spying for Iraq, the Philippines, China, Taiwan, or Israel.

Moreover, the U.S. government made sure those anti-terrorists were convicted. Its Office for Cuba Broadcasting subsidized Miami area journalists to produce over 800 prejudicial newspaper reports or television presentation so as to influence community and jury before and during their long trial.

Lastly, for the sake of destabilization a flood of U.S. money flows through private and university affiliated agencies in Southern Florida on its way to counter-revolutionaries in Cuba. Likely fallout from such a program would be a community ethos that encourages the terrorist faithful to move ahead on their own.

The sparse announcement from the Cuban Interior Ministry indicated that the four men arrested “admitted that these plans have been organized under the leadership of Miami-based individuals, such as Santiago Álvarez Fernández Magriñá, Osvaldo Mitat, and Manuel Alzugaray who are closely linked to international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles.”

Lawyer and construction magnate Álvarez contributed mightily to Miami’s terrorist-friendly atmosphere. In August 2004 he sent two airplanes to Panama to fetch Posada and three Miamians released early from prison to which they were sentenced for the assassination attempt against President Castro. Posada was dropped off in Honduras. Álvarez’ yacht brought him to Miami the following year.

In late 2005 Broward County police discovered Álvarez’ cache of 20 automatic weapons, plus grenades, a grenade launcher, ammunition, gas masks, and a silencer. Other illegal weapons belonging to Álvarez surfaced in the Bahamas. Through plea bargaining he and employee Osvaldo Mitat received reduced sentences of 30 months and two years, respectively. Allegedly Álvarez once tried to have Havana’s Tropicana nightclub bombed.

At far as the New York Times is concerned, the arrest in Cuba of men bent on terror is a Cuban problem, not a U.S. one. Its May 8 report said that Álvarez “denies any involvement in the alleged plot. Some others here (Miami) raised questions about how much the case is about crime and how much is about politics…. [A] week after Washington again kept Cuba on its short list of state sponsors of terrorism, the Cuban government publicly announced that violent plots persist. Cuba-watchers said the case was hard to separate from political theater.”