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Obama Aids Apologize For Not Recognizing Armenian Genocide

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Two former aides of President Barack Obama say his administration failed by not officially declaring that the mass slaughter of Armenians roughly a century ago constituted genocide. Samantha Power, Obama’s ambassador to the United Nations, said, “I’m sorry that we disappointed so many Armenian Americans.” Turkish leaders have warned for years that official U.S. recognition of an Armenian genocide would be harmful to the US’ relationship with Turkey.

“Show Some Proof Or Shut Up” Putin Lashes Out At Obama:

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by Tyler Durden,

Putin has had enough of the relentless barrage of US accusations that he, personally, “hacked the US presidential election.”

The Russian president’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said on Friday that the US must either stop accusing Russia of meddling in its elections or prove it. Peskov said it was “indecent” of the United States to “groundlessly” accuse Russia of intervention in its elections.

“You need to either stop talking about it, or finally show some kind of proof. Otherwise it just looks very indecent”, Peskov told Reporters in Tokyo where Putin is meeting with Japan PM Abe, responding to the latest accusations that Russia was responsible for hacker attacks.

Previously, on Thursday, Peskov told the AP the report was “laughable nonsense“, while Russian foreign ministry spox Maria Zakharova accused “Western media” of being a “shill” and a “mouthpiece of various power groups”, and added that “it’s not the general public who’s being manipulated,” Zakharova said. “the general public nowadays can distinguish the truth. It’s the mass media that is manipulating themselves.”

Meanwhile, on Friday Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister told state television network, Russia 24, he was “dumbstruck” by the NBC report which alleges that Russian President Vladimir Putin was personally involved in an election hack.

The report cited U.S. intelligence officials that now believe with a “high level of confidence” that Putin became personally involved in a secret campaign to influence the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. “I think this is just silly, and the futility of the attempt to convince somebody of this is absolutely obvious,” Lavrov added, according to the news outlet.

As a reminder, last night Obama vowed retaliatory action against Russia for its meddling in the US presidential election last month.  “I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections that we need to take action and we will at a time and place of our own choosing,” Obama told National Public Radio. 

US intelligence agencies in October pinned blame on Russia for election-related hacking. At the time, the White House vowed a “proportional response” to the cyberactivity, though declined to preview what that response might entail. Meanwhile, both President-elect Donald Trump, the FBI, and the ODNI have dismissed the CIA’s intelligence community’s assessment, for the the same reason Putin finally lashed out at Obama: there is no proof.

That, however, has never stopped the US from escalating a geopolitical conflict to the point of war, or beyond, so pay close attention to what Obama says this afternoon.

According to an NBC report, a team of analysts at Eurasia Group said in a note on Friday that they believe the outgoing administration is likely to take action which could result in a significant barrier for Trump’s team once he takes office in January.

“It is unlikely that U.S. intelligence reports will change Trump’s intention to initiate a rapprochement with Moscow, but the congressional response following its own investigations could obstruct the new administration’s effort,” Eurasia Group analysts added.

At the same time, Wikileaks offered its “validation” services, tweeting that “Obama should submit any Putin documents to WikiLeaks to be authenticated to our standards if he wants them to be seen as credible.”

Source: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-12-16/putin-lashes-out-obama-show-some-proof-or-shut

Obama is doing his best to muddy the water between Russia and U.S. before he leaves.

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US President Barack Obama has ordered American intelligence agencies to investigate Russian cyber attacks as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) concluded that Russia moved deliberately to help elect Donald Trump as president, not just to undermine the US political process more generally.

Obama requested that the intelligence agencies issue a report before he leaves office next month, White House Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser Lisa Monaco told reporters Friday.

“The President has directed the Intelligence Community to conduct a full review of what happened during the 2016 election process. It is to capture lessons learned from that and to report to a range of stakeholders,” Monaco said.

Obama issued the order shortly before The Washington Post reported that US intelligence agencies have identified individuals with connections to the Russian government who were part of a wider Russian operation to boost Trump and reduce Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the election.

Apparently, before publishing the report, the Post informed the White House about the content of its story, as this is standard practice with some American newspapers.

Citing unnamed US officials briefed on the matter, the Post said individuals connected to Moscow provided thousands of hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and others, including the chairman of Clinton’s presidential campaign, to WikiLeaks.

The hacked emails provided to WikiLeaks were a regular source of embarrassment to the Clinton campaign during the presidential race.

“It is the assessment of the intelligence community that Russia’s goal here was to favor one candidate over the other, to help Trump get elected,” the Post quoted a senior US official as saying. “That’s the consensus view.”

It was now “quite clear” that electing Trump was Russia’s goal, the Post quoted officials as saying on condition of anonymity.

However, the CIA’s conclusion was not based on a formal assessment by all 17 US intelligence agencies, the Post said. There are still minor disagreements among intelligence officials about the assessment because some questions are unanswered.

Intelligence agencies did not have specific information showing Moscow directed the individuals to pass the hacked emails to WikiLeaks and those individuals were “one step” removed from the Russian government rather than government employees, another senior official told the Post.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has said in a television interview that the Russian government was not the source of the emails, the Post said.

In October, the US government formally accused Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against Democratic Party organizations ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election.

Trump has repeatedly rejected reports that Russian hackers were working to help his campaign and says the reports were politically motivated.

Trump’s transition office issued a statement Friday questioning the credibility of the CIA in response to the report. “These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction,” the statement said. “The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It’s now time to move on and ‘Make America Great Again.'”

Thousands take to Athens’ streets in protest to Obama visit

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Greek riot policemen clash with protesters during a demonstration against the visit of US President Barack Obama, in Athens, Greece, November 15, 2016.

Greek riot policemen clash with protesters during a demonstration against the visit of US President Barack Obama, in Athens, Greece, November 15, 2016.

Violent clashes have broken out between Greek police and demonstrators protesting US President Barack Obama’s visit to Athens.

Riot police used teargas to disperse the around-7,000-strong crowd of protesters who had taken to the streets in central Athens on Tuesday.

The protesters had initially planned to march towards the US embassy, but clashes with police disrupted the march.

All manners of protest had been banned in the city over Obama’s trip, with police parking buses along the US president’s route.

The protests turned violent after demonstrators attempted to break through police cordons around the Greek parliament and US embassy.

Petrol bombs were also thrown towards police officers in the city’s northern districts. 

According to reports, over 5,000 police forces have been stationed in the city to disrupt the protesters.

RT quoted Greek journalist Aris Chatzistefanou as saying that the demonstration was being held against the US’s policies which are “creating tensions” with other countries across the globe, especially with Russia and China.

“While the Greek government is trying to present the visit of Obama as a visit of a peacemaker, thousands of demonstrators came onto the streets to protest US policy in [such] parts of the world from Latin America to Middle East, Afghanistan and Syria,” he added.

Will President Trump Reverse Obama/Erdogan Plan For “Seizing, Holding, And Occupying” Syrian Territory In Raqqa

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erdogan-terroristBy Brandon Turbeville

As the U.S. Presidential selection draws to a close, the United States and Turkey have announced a new plan to defeat ISIS, the same terrorist organization both countries have created, funded, armed, and facilitated, in Syria. The plan revolves around the conquering, occupation, and governing of sovereign Syrian territory in the East, most notably Raqqa.

According to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph Dunford, after meeting with his Turkish counterpart, that “The coalition and Turkey will work together on the long-term plan for seizing, holding and governing Raqqa.”

The statement by Dunford seems to confirm the fact that the United States will not move forward in its campaign for Raqqa without working closely with the Turks, who are themselves concerned about the makeup of the proxy forces destined to hold power once the campaign is over. The Syrian Democratic Forces, the proxies of choice in this battle, are made up of many Kurdish militias and fighters, an issue that provides much worry on the part of the Turkish government.

President Obama’s 2013 Golf Trip With Tiger Woods Cost Taxpayers $3.6 Million

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obama-tiger-golgBy on

Golf, as I have written before is a wonderful game. It is a thinking persons game. It is profoundly challenging and one can play it practically until they cart you away to the afterlife clubhouse. That Obama also likes golf is one of the few things on which he and I could (in theory) relate. (My usual go to with my “progressive” friends is classic rock. If one can drink a beer, keep one’s politics in check for a couple of hours and talk T-Rex and The Kinks we can be friends.) That he has played as much golf as he has in his presidency I also see as a positive. I’d rather have him wandering the fairways than getting all “inspired” back in the White House.

But a $3.6 million golf trip on the taxpayer’s dime is just insulting.

(From Mediaite)

In February 2013, President Obama took a four-day golf vacation to Florida where he played a round withTiger Woods, and took a lesson from Woods’s former coach, Butch Harmon.

A new report from The Washington Times says that the long weekend getaway cost taxpayers $3.6 million.

Click here for the article.

WASHINGTON: “Votes Override Obama” overwhelming majority in US Congress forces Saudi 9/11 bill through

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obama-vitoWASHINGTON — An overwhelming majority in Congress on Wednesday overturned President Obama’s veto of legislation that would allow families of those killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to sue Saudi Arabia for any role in the plot, the first successful override vote of his presidency.

The 9/11 override is a remarkable yet complicated bipartisan rebuttal, even as some of its supporters conceded that they did not fully support the legislation they had just voted for. Mr. Obama and his allies vowed to find a way to tweak the legislation later.

In recent days, Mr. Obama, Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter and General Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, all wrote letters to Congress warning of the dangers of overriding the veto.

The law “could be devastating to the Department of Defense and its service members,” Mr. Obama wrote, “and there is no doubt that the consequences could be equally significant for our foreign affairs and intelligence communities.” The White House and some lawmakers were already plotting how they could weaken the law in the near future.

Yet most of Mr. Obama’s greatest allies on Capitol Hill, who have labored for nearly eight years to stop most bills he opposes from even crossing his desk, turned against him, joining Republicans in the remonstrance.

“This is a decision I do not take lightly,” said Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and one of the authors of this legislation. “This bill is near and dear to my heart as a New Yorker, because it would allow the victims of 9/11 to pursue some small measure of justice, finally giving them a legal avenue to pursue foreign sponsors of the terrorist attack that took from them the lives of their loved ones.”

Only one senator, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, sided with the president as 97 others voted Wednesday to override. In the House, the veto override was approved a few hours later, 348 to 77.

The bill succeeded not with significant congressional debate or intense pressure from voters, but rather through the sheer will of the victims’ families, who seized on the 15th anniversary of the attack and an election year to lean on members of Congress. That effort was aided by the waning patience of lawmakers with the kingdom in recent years.

The Senate vote also represents another White House miscalculation on Capitol Hill, where it was once again slow to pressure members and to see the cracks in its firewall against the bill.

Further, the veto override, while thrilling to many Republicans, came on a bill that was far from the Republicans’ priorities of unraveling the health care law and pushing back on government regulations. Nor was it a measure they had hoped to secure with the president’s help, like overhauling the tax code or passing a major trade agreement.

Obama implicated in Clinton email scandal – New FBI docs

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obama-implicatedPresident Barack Obama used a pseudonym when communicating with then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by email, while her IT company referred to her email deleting as a “cover-up”, new FBI documents reveal.

The heavily-redacted documents, almost 200 pages, include summaries of interviews with senior Clinton aides concerning the private email server, and brings to light details previously unknown.

During the interview with Huma Abedin, who served as deputy chief of staff under Clinton, the FBI reportedly presented her with an email exchange between Clinton and a person she did not recognize. The FBI then revealed the unknown person’s name was believed to be a pseudonym used by Obama. Abedin reacted by saying, “How is this not classified?”

This exchange could expose Obama as having mislead the public on the issue, given his 2015 statement that he found out about Clinton’s use of a private email server “the same time everybody else learned it, through news reports.”

The State Department will not make public the emails Clinton exchanged with Obama, citing “presidential communications privilege,” as reason to withhold the emails under the Freedom of Information Act, Politico reports.

The documents also include interview notes with other senior Clinton aides; Cheryl Mills, Jake Sullivan and former Bill Clinton advisor Justin Cooper, who registered the clintonemail.com domain. Romanian hacker Guccifer and a number of state department officials were also interviewed.

The latest FBI document cache also refers to the engineer who used BleachBit to permanently delete emails from Clinton’s server soon after the House Benghazi Committee issued a subpoena for documents relating to the 2012 attack on the US embassy in Libya. According to the engineer, he did this “of his own accord based on his normal practices as an engineer.”

Documents show employees from Platte River Networks, the IT company who managed Clinton’s emails, referring to a request to wipe emails in 2014 as the “Hilary [sic] cover-up operation”. An employee told the FBI this was a joke.

Clinton aide, Bryan Pagliano, said concerns were raised about whether Clinton’s server created a “federal records retention issue” by state department officials in 2009 or 2010. When he communicated these concerns to Mills, however, she said that Clinton’s  predecessor, Colin Powell, had also used private email.

The reports further reveal Clinton’s alleged ineptitude with technology, with aides claiming she “could not use a computer,” and didn’t know her email password.

Abedin said she had two computers in her State Department office, one for unclassified communications and another for classified communications. She did most of her work on the unclassified computer and would go “days or weeks without logging into the classified system.”

One redacted interviewee described himself as a “Clintonista” and said he has a relationship with the Clintons dating back years. He said he would meet with Clinton four or five times a day and initially traveled with her until she was comfortable with the position of secretary of state.

Obama rather protects Turkish and Saudi Interest over American People concern, vetoes bill allowing 9/11 victims to sue Saudi

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9-11

Robert Peraza, who lost his son Robert David Peraza, pauses at his son’s name at the North Pool of the 9/11 Memorial during tenth anniversary ceremonies at the site of the World Trade Center in New York, September 11, 2011. © Justin Lane / Reuters

President Barack Obama has vetoed the legislation that would allow families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia. The bill passed unanimously in both the House and the Senate and was met with widespread public support.

Known as “Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act” or JASTA, the bill creates an exemption to the doctrine of sovereign immunity established by a 1976 law, thus allowing US citizens to sue foreign countries for terrorism that kills Americans on US soil.

Fifteen out of 19 men who hijacked commercial airliners and used them as missiles to target the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 were subjects of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Two were from the United Arab Emirates.

The Senate passed JASTA in May, while the House voted on it just before the 15th anniversary of 9/11.

Republican majority leaders in Congress are confident they have enough votes to override the veto.

“There will be a roll call vote on the veto override,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) told reporters on Tuesday. “Our assumption is that the veto will be overridden.”

“My message to the caucus is going to be, unless there are 34 people willing to fall on their swords over this, it’s probably not worth falling on your sword over,” said Bob Corker (R-Tennessee), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Senator Charles Schumer (D-New York) called the veto a “disappointing decision that will be swiftly and soundly overturned” in a statement on Friday.

“If the Saudis did nothing wrong, they should not fear this legislation. If they were culpable in 9/11, they should be held accountable. The families of the victims of 9/11 deserve their day in court,” Schumer added.

Saudi Arabia unsuccessfully tried to block the bill, using the services of its many lobbyists in Washington.

Following the House vote, the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council expressed“deep concern”, with Secretary General Abdullatif al-Zayani calling JASTA “contrary to the foundations and principles of relations between states and the principle of sovereign immunity enjoyed by states,” AP reported.

The government of Qatar said the bill “violates international law, particularly the principle of sovereign equality between states,” according to Reuters.

Ahmed Aboul-Gheit, Secretary-General of the Arab League, said the bill contradicted “established norms of the international law,” according to the Egyptian state news agency MENA.

Obama offered $115bn arms sales to Saudi Arabia: Report

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obama-saudi-weaponThe administration of US President Barack Obama has offered Saudi Arabia $115 billion in arms sales, a report seen by Reuters has found.

The offer, including weapons, other military equipment and training, is the highest the United States has offered in its 71-year alliance with the monarchy, the agency reported Wednesday.

Authored by William Hartung of the US-based Center for International Policy, the report said the offers were made in 42 separate deals and most of what they consist are yet to be delivered.

According to Reuters, “US arms offers to Saudi Arabia since Obama took office in January 2009 have included everything from small arms and ammunition to tanks, attack helicopters, air-to-ground missiles, missile defense ships, and warships. Washington also provides maintenance and training to Saudi security forces.”

Hartung’s report was based on data from the Defense Security Cooperation Agency.

“It’s time for the Obama administration to use the best leverage it has – Saudi Arabia’s dependence on U.S. weapons and support – to wage the war in Yemen in the first place,” Hartung said. “The more recent deals that have involved resupplying Saudi Arabia with ammunition, bombs, and tanks to replace weaponry used up or damaged in the war in Yemen are no doubt driven in part by the effort to ‘reassure’ the Saudis that the U.S. will not tilt towards Iran in the wake of the nuclear deal.”

He further suggested that, “Pulling back the current offer of battle tanks or freezing some of the tens of billions in weapons and services in the pipeline would send a strong signal to the Saudi leadership that they need stop their indiscriminate bombing campaign and take real steps to prevent civilian casualties.”

Saudi Arabia has been incessantly pounding Yemen since March 2015, with the UN putting the death toll from the military aggression at about 10,000.

According to the Control Arms Coalition, a group that is campaigning against arms sales, Britain, France and the US are violating the 2014 Arms Trade Treaty by exporting conventional weapons to a country engaged in war crimes.

Last month, the Obama administration approved a potential $1.15 billion arms package for the Saudi monarchy.