PHILIP GIRALDI—Most CIA Stations and even the larger Bases overseas have covert action capabilities and their activity is frequently governed by the operating directives that are applied to every country where the Agency operates. In practice, covert action most often consists of recruiting, paying and directing journalists and other opinion-shapers to write stories and support narratives favorable to US interests. In some cases, depending on circumstances, the CA officers will either directly or indirectly fund groups and individuals who are opponents of the established government. If there is a major operation, like Ukraine, success comes when there is regime change.
CAPITALIST SICKNESS
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RON UNZ—ntil just a few months ago, I doubt there were many American academics more solidly situated in the topmost ranks of our elite mainstream establishment than Prof. Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University. In 1983 he gained Harvard University tenure at the remarkably young age of 28, then spent the next 19 years as a professor at that august academic institution; by the early 1990s the New York Times was already hailing him as the world’s most important figure in his field. Lured to Columbia University in 2002, he has spent the last couple of decades teaching there and also directing a couple of its research organizations, most recently the Center for Sustainable Development. TIME Magazine has twice ranked him among the world’s 100 most influential individuals, and for nearly twenty years he served as Special Advisor to several Secretary-Generals of the United Nations, while publishing many hundreds of articles and op-eds on a wide variety of subjects in our most influential media outlets.
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Wired Magazine recently ran a piece suggesting that today’s workers struggling with burnout on the job could potentially solve the problem by… getting a second job! Or maybe a third! It’s called “overworking,” the story’s author alleges, and it’s a great way to take charge of your professional life, achieve financial freedom and show those employers who’s really boss. Who knew? Jimmy and America’s Comedian Kurt Metzger discuss whether this is the most asinine idea they’ve ever heard.
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How a U.S. Colony Works: The Case of Germany
14 minutes readERIC ZUESSE—Germany’s AfD Party is one of the two Parties in Germany that are less than enthusiastically backing Germany’s anti-Russia position, the other such Party being “Die Linke” or “The Left” Party, which is Germany’s only socialist democratic Party, despite West Germany’s “Social Democratic Party” calling itself “democratic socialist” while being neither.
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Hezbollah’s drones: No more safe skies for Israel
14 minutes readFIRAS AL-SHOUFI—The Aramco attack only enhanced the regional reputation of these weapons and their ability to repeatedly infiltrate Israel’s airspace. This caught the attention of Russia, which reportedly plans to acquire Iranian drones and has requested training for Russian crews on how to operate them. While Ukrainian forces have now tested the domestically-manufactured Turkish Bayraktar drones, unlike the successes achieved by Iranian drones, Bayraktar appears to have performed poorly against the extensive Russian air defense systems. The reputation the Turkish drone earned from the battles of Azerbaijan and Armenia in the Nagarno-Karabakh region were cut short in Ukraine, as the former’s success was largely due to the absence of an effective Armenian air defense network.