Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama:

• May 21 - Uber Drivers Learn To Game Its Antisocial System
  See also: Why Silicon Valley Loved Uber More Than Everyone Else - The Atlantic

• May 22 - Venezuela - After Opposition Support 'Deflated' - U.S. Targets Food Aid Supply

• May 23 - Why Trump's Huawei Ban Is Unlikely To Persist
  A Reuters special report covers details of the long war against Huawei: Hobbling Huawei: Inside the U.S. war on China's tech giant

• May 24 - The Leaden Lady Steps Down

• May 24 - 'Troops To Iran' Scare - The Mountain Brings Forth A Mouse

• May 25 - Boeing 737 MAX Crash Reveals A Severe Problem With Older Boeing 737 NGs
  Please promote this one wide and far.

Other issues:

British media try to whitewash al-Qaeda in Syria, which controls Idleb governorate, into "moderate rebels".

• BBC: Syria group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and al-Qaeda legacy

  HTS says: Democracy is blasphemy. Shia and Christians should be slaughtered. Jihad is a holy duty.
  al-Qaeda says: Democracy is blasphemy. Shia and Christians should be slaughtered. Jihad is a holy duty.
  BBC says: See, HTS is moderate and not at all like al-Qaeda.

• Sky: Sky News crew deliberately targeted and fired at by Syrian regime forces

  The Sky crew collaborated with the U.S. Jihadi Bilal Abdul Kareem, who is allegedly on a drone kill list. BAK led them to the front line where HTS/al-Qaeda, a designated terrorist organization, at that time attacked the Syrian army. They film an al-Qaeda armored fighting vehicle that just got hit and is still burning. A shell comes down near them. They claim that they were "deliberately targeted". No shit! Here is a good thread that details the lunacy of such reporting.

On May 13 we covered the leaked OPCW engineering assessment which proves that the alleged gas attack in Douma in April 2018 was a false flag incident created by the Jihadis and their White Helmets propaganda arm. The mainstream media ignore the report the OPCW management tried to suppress. Only a few independent writers have since covered it. All make good points:

• The western media is key to Syria deceptions - Jonathan Cook
• The evidence we were never meant to see about the Douma ‘gas’ attack - Robert Fisk
• The World: What is Really Happening - Craig Murray
• Was There Or Wasn't There a Chlorine Attack in Syria Last Week? The OPCW controversy continues in a new shape. - Peter Hitchens

The Ukraine elected a new president. Now the NATO mouthpieces tell him to stay in line with their program - or else ... :

Mark Ames @MarkAmesExiled - 14:57 utc - 24 May 2019

This list of demands by western-funded Ukraine NGOs—threatening to overthrow Zelenskiy if he doesn't follow their demands—perfect example of Arundhati Roy's critique of "civil society" as an elite construct designed to subvert & control popular democracy:
- Joint statement by civil society representatives on the first political steps of the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky

Sure enough one of the signatories is "NGO 'CentreUA'"—same NGO, funded by Omidyar, Soros, USAID, that organized Maidan revolution. That's like a gun pointed at Zelensky's head. Outrageous.
- Pierre Omidyar co-funded Ukraine revolution groups with US government, documents show

Zelensky was elected by 75% of Ukrainians. Who the fuck elected Pierre Omidyar, George Soros, USAID, National Endowment for Democracy — and their “civil society” satraps — to supersede Ukraine’s democracy?

Fear not. There are stronger powers involved:

max seddon @maxseddon - 7:53 utc - 26 May 2019

Ukraine’s western backers are worried notorious oligarch Igor Kolomoisky’s influence on new president Zelensky could torpedo its IMF support. Now Kolomoisky says Ukraine should just tell the IMF to screw itself and default. Our @FT interview: on.ft.com/2HUWraw [paywalled]

Kolomoisky said the idea he owns Zelensky is so common it’s awkward. “People come to see me in Israel and say, 'Congrats! Well done!' I say, 'for what? My birthday's in February.' They say, 'Who needs a birthday when you've got a whole president!'"

Use as open thread ...

Posted by b on May 26, 2019 at 12:00 PM | Permalink