Media is reporting that former senator Joe Lieberman is a front runner for FBI director without mentioning Lieberman is senior associate at a law firm that represents Trump & has done so in several matters since at least 2001.

Some of the cases involved Trump’s casinos, bankruptcies, defamation cases, his divorce from his first wife, & threats to sue the NY Times for publishing pieces of Trump’s tax returns. Lieberman is also registered as a lobbyist for a Libyan politician.

The corruption appears to be a bottomless pit & doesn’t include just Donald Trump.

It’s really swell that Human Rights Watch is lobbying the Pentagon to review its measures for civilian protection in Afghanistan–especially after the US dropped the nearly 11 ton “mother of all bombs” in April.

In their report, HRW said casualties in Afghanistan are steadily rising & in 2016 were the highest recorded since 2008 with 3,948 civilian deaths & 7,920 injuries. Of course, civilian death estimates are always conservative & injuries is a term that covers life-altering incapacities like lost limbs, concussions, shattered bones, shrapnel that cannot be removed, infection & sepsis. Not to mention PTSD from nearly 16 years of war trauma or massive social dislocations like homelessness, child labor, millions of refugees (including to Europe where they are denied entry).

So why can’t a human rights organization bring itself to condemn the US war in Afghanistan? Why does it stop at calling for better measures to conduct war when there is no good way to do that?

This photo of an Afghan boy is quite dated because there is no recent photojournalism covering the Afghan war as part of the news blackout. It’s a consequence of journalists being embedded with the military.

HRW report: https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/05/17/us-improve-civilian-protection-afghanistan

This morning in Syria, a militia aligned with the Assad regime got too close to US special forces operations which are directed primarily against ISIS. The US Pentagon claims the militia was warned to back off & when they did not bombed them.

That’s kind of like when the US warned Russia & thus Syria before bombing the empty airport hangars.

How does that accord with that regime change scenario?

Of course, this is from mainstream media & Eva Bartlett who is embedded up the ass of the Syrian army says everything MSM reports is lies. Only Eva speaks truth.

“Essentially, powerful man with the composure of a hormonal teen tweets about himself every day & determines news agenda across the world.”

–Tweeted by Kashmiri writer Mirza Waheed

Mirza Waheed‏ @MirzaWaheed

https://twitter.com/OccupiedKashmir/status/865243837286973441

Occupied Kashmir tweeted this video of an incident last week documenting the extrajudicial execution of two Kashmiris by Indian soldiers.

This video is what India is attempting to censor with its bans on the internet & social media.

Forget Russia. Do libertarians really want a president who is such a cry baby?

Mosul Apocalypse: emancipation US-style:

Iraqi civilians are scrambling over shifting rubble to flee US airstrikes & crossfire between ISIS fighters & Iraqi troops. See how US emancipation works? To liberate Mosul from an estimated 500 remaining ISIS fighters, the US drops bombs in concert with Iraqi army ground operations heedless of civilian safety.

When operations to take west Mosul from ISIS began February 19th, there were 750,000 civilians living there. It is a city, not a military installation, so inevitably the targets are residential areas, mosques, markets, train stations & inevitably the victims are civilians.

Reports conflict about the number of civilians killed & it’s not sure what the estimates are based on. Airwars reports that the civilian death toll has been massive & just in the first week of the siege an Iraqi army source estimated 3,864 civilians were killed. How could it not be massive when as of March 31st, the US coalition had carried out 11,554 airstrikes in Iraq trying to take out ISIS? After reports that hundreds of civilians were bombed to death, US & Iraqi military officials claim they were unaware civilians were living in the houses. Do they think the people of west Mosul keep livestock or maybe rockets in their homes? Like Israel claimed Hamas stored rockets in hospitals & homes when they bombed Gaza to smithereens in 2014?

It’s been difficult to judge the scale of the diaspora since media coverage about Mosul is down to a trickle but yesterday the UN coordinator for Iraq reported that nearly 700,000 have fled Mosul since the siege against ISIS began last October, including 500,000 from west Mosul alone. That means there are at least 250,000 civilians remaining in the area subject to air & ground missile bombardment.

The UN official also reported that refugee camps for the Mosul diaspora now shelter 326,000 people with space for another 42,000. Construction of other camps is underway to shelter 39,000 more people but the US $985 million appeal for Iraq humanitarian is less than 30 percent funded. Even if all the available spaces are filled & the new camps built, that would still leave 300,000 refugees with no place to live. And after the tents are built, what about medical care, food, water, toilets, schools, mosques? How long will they live in those camps? Will they ever be able to return to their homes or will it all be rubble like Gaza & Aleppo?

Thousands of the displaced, including children & the elderly, are fleeing with untreated injuries, some with infectious diseases, some with special needs, all with war trauma. Did the US coalition & Iraqi regime consider any of this when they began bombing Mosul to smithereens? How does such an apocalypse get classified as a liberation?

The only principled antiwar demand is for the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of US coalition forces from Iraq & Syria. Stop the bombing. Out now.

(Photo by Danish Siddiqui/Reuters)

https://www.facebook.com/OccupyDemocrats/videos/1543006679

Trump plagiarized his commencement speech from the movie Legally Blind & progressives are actually arguing that impeachment would be a major strategic blunder (In These Times), that Trump is a symptom, not the problem (Chris Hedges), & denouncing liberals (80% of the American people) who want his ties to Russia investigated.

Next week he will be giving a speech in Saudi Arabia on Islam. Who will he be plagiarizing? David Duke, the KKK guy, or his own campaign speeches? What can possibly go wrong? Other than he leads more people to completely lose their marbles?

When I came of age in the 60s, public cursing was unacceptable; it wasn’t acceptable within most families. Ours was the generation that ended that taboo for the better or worse to human culture.
With the emergence of feminism, young women became proficient at cursing as an act of defiance against inequality. Since I worked in a male-dominated work place, I became quite proficient as a matter of defense, to back off those who thought they could walk all over women.

But I don’t think it’s appropriate in an international forum like social media to curse a lot. Call me a prude, but I think it lowers the intellectual level to use blue language & it offends many people’s sense of refinement & civility.

Flipping the bird is considered vulgar & uncouth to many though it’s an ancient international expression of anger. The photo of the young Kashmiri woman offended some who do not want the dignity of their struggle compromised. It isn’t compromised by women expressing their anger aggressively & publicly, especially when they are terrified for their lives against pellets, tear gas, assault, humiliations.

Most who see the young woman admire her courage & defiance standing up to the Indian army. Those who object will have to take it up with the protesters since they appear quite capable of expressing their sentiments despite the intimidation of soldiers pointing guns at them.

Tamils stand with Kashmir.

(Tweeted by Symmetry)