898 Trump's appointments a betrayal?

Trump's appointments a betrayal?

Newsletter published on 17 December 2016

(1) Trump's appointments a betrayal - Troy Southgate
(2) Perfection is not one of the options; we can only choose the Least Bad
(3) Trump appoints Goldman Sachs president as director of National
Economic Council
(4) Progressive Education? Culture War in the High Schools?
(5) John Podesta’s emails were not hacked. He fell for a phishing scheme

(1) Trump's appointments a betrayal - Troy Southgate
Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2016 23:14:09 +0000 (UTC)
From: Troy Southgate <arktoslondon@yahoo.co.uk>

As I said on my Facebook page recently:

Not content with appointing Goldman Sachs banker Steven Mnuchin as
Secretary of the Treasury, fossil fuel pawn Scott Pruitt to run the
Environmental Protection Agency, ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson as
Secretary of State and Dakota-harassing scumbag Rick Perry as Secretary
of Energy, Donald Trump has now accepted into 'his' administration Gary
D. Cohn, the President and Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Goldman
Sachs itself. Cohn, who was earning an annual salary of US$22 million in
2014, will control the country's National Economic Council. When will
those who voted for this ignominious farce have the basic courage and
decency to admit that they have served as unwitting accomplices in the
reorganisation and strengthening of the plutocracy? The truth hurts.

This is what needs to be exposed.

(2) Perfection is not one of the options; we can only choose the Least Bad
- Peter Myers, December 17, 2016

Troy,

James Morris says much the same as you do.

But Hillary would have been worse. The smear campaign about Trump being
a stooge of Putin - aimed at the Electoral Council - shows clearly that
a major change in Foreign Policy is under way. Friendship with Russia
will lead to fraternity rather than war in Europe. At the same time,
China's ambitions will be curtailed, and Russia will no longer be forced
to rely so heavily on it.

The US and its proxies will stop backing Islamic terrorists as agents of
Regime Change. If Qatar and Saudi Arabia do continue such backing, Trump
is likely to front them publicly over it.

The end of the Culture War will also ease the antagonisms in Western
societies.

On Economic Policy, the question is whether Trump's appointees will be
able to "do their own thing", or forced to co-operate for the benefit of
all. One can only hope.

On the Middle East, Trump may move the US Embassy to Jerusalem. That
symbolic gesture would please many Jews. But there must still be a
chance that he will also pursue his earlier plan of solving Mid-East
animosities.

Trots and others on the Ultra Left constantly critique society by
comparing existing reality with a benchmark, which they present as a
goal. That amounts to aiming for Perfection. It's foolish, because
Perfection is never one of the options.

Equally, Trump's regime will be far from perfect. Within a year or two,
many of us may be looking for alternatives. But we should not forget
that Hillary would have pursued war against Russaia, and even more
extremes of the Nanny State.

(3) Trump appoints Goldman Sachs president as director of National
Economic Council

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/09/gary-cohn-will-be-bringing-worries-about-fed-policy-to-trumps-white-house.html

Gary Cohn will be bringing worries about Fed policy to Trump's White House

Jeff Cox | @JeffCoxCNBCcom

Friday, 9 Dec 2016 | 3:16 PM ET

With Gary Cohn as one of his top economic advisors, Donald Trump can
expect to hear from an economic optimist leery of the role central banks
have taken on to try to engineer growth.

The Goldman Sachs president and chief operating officer would bring yet
another insider's view to a Trump White House as director of the
National Economic Council. The position is central to generating a
unified economic message for the administration.

In interviews over the past couple of years, Cohn, 56, has expressed
some confidence in the economy. Speaking to CNBC eight days after
Trump's stunning upset of Hillary Clinton in the presidential race, Cohn
also was cautious on certain aspects.

"We're all giving President-elect Trump and his transition team the
benefit of the doubt," he said. "We're all listening to what he's
saying, we're all listening to what he's doing. We're all cautiously
optimistic. We're waiting to see what happens. As we get more clarity,
the markets will react."

Indeed, the markets have reacted, and quite positively.

The Dow industrials are up about 7.5 percent since the day after the
election, and the KBW Nasdaq Bank Index has soared more than 22 percent.
Cohn's Goldman Sachs has surged even more, up close to 30 percent.

Still, few believe the road ahead will be smooth as Trump's
unpredictability always looms.

Cohn has expressed considerable worry over the past couple of years
about central bank policy. He has recognized the need for the emergency
measures the Fed and others have taken, but has wondered about the
ramifications further into the future.

When the discussion turned to bond rates, Cohn said: "I am building the
case for rates going up for the right reasons. That said, I am concerned
how much U.S. rates can dislocate from the rest of the world, and I
think that's a big issue."

Indeed, the U.S. central bank has been talking about tightening policy
at a time when most of its global counterparts are in loosening mode.

Cohn worries that will result in a much stronger dollar that could slow
the U.S. recovery.

"The reality of the world is we have a soaring dollar and the effects on
that soaring dollar are just starting to be felt," he said during a
March 15, 2015, interview. "It's going to make U.S. exports more
expensive. So what does that mean for U.S. manufacturers and what does
that mean for U.S. jobs? It's not going to be positive."

The market also has been impacted by low rates and too much regulation
he said in another interview.

"I won't say markets are broken. I think they're not as efficient as
they should be," Cohn told CNBC on June 23, 2015.

"It's the cumulative effect when you look at regulation. No one
regulation by itself has had a bad effect. In fact, many of the
regulations have had positive effects. It is the cumulative effect of
many of the regulations that we put on the market community that have
had an effect on the market."

(4) Progressive Education? Culture War in the High Schools?

From: John Cameron <blackheathbooks@internode.on.net>
Subject: WHAT EDUCATION
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2016 08:35:13 +1100

Peter, May I ask have you read Anthony C Sutton booklet "How the Order
Controls Education"?

Relevant John Dewey the father of Progressive Education, Columbia centre
of operations.

"The Naked Capitalist." By W.Cleon Skousen.A review & commentary on
Dr.Carrol Quigley's book "Tragedy & Hope." pp 68-72 The Subversion of
American Education.

Dr.Felix Wittmer "Conquest of the American Mind."

Dr.Geo.S.Coutts " Dare the Schools Build a new Social Order ?

"Dr.E.Merril Root. "Brain Washing in the High Schools." also "
Collectivism on the Campus." Augustin G.Rudd." Bending the Twig."

Hegel,W.M.Wundt,G.Stanley Hall & or.

(5) John Podesta’s emails were not hacked. He fell for a phishing scheme

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/demonization_of_putin_as_personally_behind_clinton_hack_20161216

Demonization of Putin as ‘Personally’ Behind Clinton Hack Is an Old
Propaganda Technique

Posted on Dec 16, 2016

By Juan Cole

The leaked allegations supposedly from the CIA that Russian President
Vladimir Putin "personally" directed how hacked emails from the Clinton
campaign should be used should be treated with a good deal of skepticism.

I have already said that the allegations of effective Russian
interference in the US election do not make any sense to me. There is no
point at which anything Russia is said to have done can be shown to have
determined the election outcome.

The things that appear to have hurt Clinton late in the election were
her "deplorables" comment about Trump supporters, and the Comey letter
about the new emails the FBI had found on Anthony Weiner’s computer.
Neither of these incidents had any Russian connection.

I don’t doubt that Russian intelligence was interested in sowing discord
in the US around its election. I am saying that there is no evidence
that it succeeded.

Moreover, John Podesta’s emails were not hacked. He fell for a phishing
scheme in which he received a phony email asking for his login
information, which he answered after a technical assistant incorrectly
told him the email was legitimate (he meant to say illegitimate). The
phishing scheme could easily have failed (never click on a link in your
email and then enter sensitive information– open any login page you use
manually so as to make sure you aren’t going to a spoofed address; and,
first examine the address line from which the email originated; phonies
can be easily spotted. People you deal with legitimately aren’t going to
ask you for your login information–they already have that).

Then what?

A phishing scheme is more the speed of that fabled Nigerian
prince-scammer than the president of the Russian Federation.

The perpetrators of the phishing scheme, moreover, were not Russian FSB
intelligence. They were just a civilian gang that may or may not have
been employed by the Russian government.

Given that no one can point to any specific incident or incidents in
which the Podesta emails had a discernible effect on the election, there
is little reason to blame the outcome of the election on Russia.

But the most recent psy-ops leaks, allegedly from the CIA, speak in
loving detail of how Putin himself took control of the operation, as
part of a longstanding vendetta against Sec. Clinton.

No new information is added by such an allegation of Putin’s personal
involvement. If you said that the Russian government did it, you’d be
saying Putin. The image being created, of Putin personally intervening
in an American election, is intended to pull at heartstrings. It is
propaganda via personalization and demonization.

Personalization and demonization are well-known Washington propaganda
techniques.

At one point George W. Bush maintained that he had been right to
overthrow Saddam Hussein of Iraq even though that country had not had
any dangerous unconventional weapons. The reason? Saddam Hussein, he
said, was "evil."

The "evilness" of an opponent of US policy is metaphysical, and can be
used to justify almost anything.

Back in 1953, Iran had a nationalist prime minister who wanted a fair
share from BP of the money from sale of Iran’s own oil. His name,
Mohammad Mosaddegh, showed his aristocratic lineage. The Eisenhower
administration and the compliant Washington press corps waged a campaign
of personal vilification against Mosaddegh, hinting around that he was a
communist and a puppet of the Soviet Union. This was an aristocratic
nationalist!

Demonizing Mosaddegh was a prelude to the CIA buying a crowd and
overthrowing the elected prime minister of a major parliamentary
country. It has never to this day recovered its democracy.

Hugo Chavez of Venezuela was also demonized.

So was Yasser Arafat. Salvador Allende of Chile.

Whenever the US intelligence agencies collaborate with mass media to
throw up on the screen the face of a foreign leader, giving him devil’s
horns and making his face red with the flames of hell, we have to take
that depiction as a sign that they intend to do something to that country.

—–

Related video:

PBS NewsHour: "How Putin could have been involved in U.S. election
disruption"