Saturday, April 18, 2015

The Weaponization of Passed Gas on Expensive Leather

On April 15, 2015 the House Foreign Affairs Committee met to discuss "Russia's Weaponization of Information."



This hearing singled out Russia Today which is obviously a front for the FSB and plays off the fact that the Western media cannot frame critical observations of governments and corporations the way Russia Today can, without giving away their own game.

In fact it is a game for both sides. Here is how Voice of America frames it:



The acting CEO of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which runs Voice of America, says they will counter Putin's information attack with a counter-strategy, as if this is all something new.

The BBG has people like Karen Kornbluh on its board of directors:

"Ambassador Karen Kornbluh is the Executive Vice President of External Affairs for Nielsen, responsible for global public policy, privacy strategy, and corporate social responsibility. Prior to joining Nielsen, Kornbluh was the U.S. Ambassador to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) from 2009 – 2012. Previously, she was Policy Director for then Senator Barack Obama.  In the Clinton Administration, she served as Deputy Chief of Staff at the US Treasury Department and Director of the Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs at the Federal Communications Commission.  Additionally, Kornbluh founded the New America Foundation’s Work and Family Program and is a senior fellow for Digital Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations."
http://www.bbg.gov/about-the-agency/board/

Chairman Royce then asks Peter Pomerantsev of the Legatum Institute for his opinion on the matter at hand.




The Legatum Insitute was founded by one of two brothers that used to be heavily invested in Gazprom, the world's (and Russia's) largest gas company:

"By the end of 1994, the Chandlers had snapped up enough vouchers to buy a 4 percent stake in Unified Energy Systems, Russia’s largest electric utility; 11 percent of Mosenergo, the Moscow electricity distributor; 5 percent stakes in each of the three main production arms of Yukos Oil Co.; a 15percent stake in Novolipetsk Metallurgical Kombinat,the country’s biggest steelmaker; and a "small", undisclosed stake in Gazprom, the world’s No. 1 gas producer. The metric they used in each case was simple: The book value of assets vastly exceeded the companies’ market capitalizations. With more than $194 million invested at the time, the brothers say they were the largest foreign portfolio investors in Russia."

also:
 "...Sputnik — an outfit controlled by Russian financier Boris Jordan and backed by, among others, Soros Fund Management and Harvard Management Co. — sold its NLMK stake at a profit before the appeals process was finished. A decade later Sputnik’s actions still rankle Richard Chandler. “We would have hoped that Soros Fund Management and Harvard would have recognized the opportunity to set up Novolipetsk as a model of good corporate governance in Russia,” he says.

-both quotes via Institutional Investor, March 2006.

So, back to Peter Pomerantsev:



 Peter Pomerantsev is a Senior Fellow to the Transitions Forum, a Legatum offshoot:

"The 'Transitions Lecture Series' explores the role of economic reform in the success of democratic development. This is a joint-initiative between the Legatum Institute, the National Endowment for Democracy’s International Forum for Democratic Studies, and World Affairs." 

National Endowment for Democracy is well known as an intelligence front:





"NED was created in 1983, when the CIA was being accused of covertly bribing politicians and setting up phony civil society front organizations. According to Allen Weinstein, who was responsible for establishing the NED during the Reagan Administration: “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.” (Washington Post, Sept. 21, 1991)."
-Michael Chossudovssky, Global Research.

https://consortiumnews.com/2014/02/27/a-shadow-us-foreign-policy/ 



Ok then, World Affairs editorial board member Jeffrey Gedmin:

"...is a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, in Washington, and at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, in London. He has served as president of the London-based Legatum Institute, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague, and the Aspen Institute Berlin. In the 1990s, he was a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where he directed the New Atlantic Initiative. Gedmin is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post and his commentary and articles have appeared in numerous publications. He is author of The Hidden Hand: Gorbachev and the Collapse of East Germany and the recipient of the Golden Linden Medal from the Czech government for his contributions to democracy, human rights, and liberty. He earned his doctorate degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, where he has also taught, and currently serves on the board of the school’s masters program. Gedmin was awarded an honorary doctorate by the Tbilisi State University, in Georgia, is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, in New York." 



Radio Free Europe has long been known as a CIA front:
and
Charles Douglas Jackson, President of the Free Europe Committee: 

Jackson became the publisher of Fortune Magazine and from 1951-52 he served as President of the Free Europe Committee. He also wrote speeches for Dwight D. Eisenhower during his presidential campaign. Jackson was rewarded in February 1953 by being appointed as Special Assistant to the President. This included the role of Eisenhower's liaison between the CIA and the Pentagon. According to the Eisenhower Presidential Library files in Abilene, Kansas, Jackson's "area responsibility was loosely defined as international affairs, cold war planning, and psychological warfare. His main function was the coordination of activities aimed at interpreting world situations to the best advantage of the United States and her allies and exploiting incidents which reflected negatively on the Soviet Union, Communist China and other enemies in the Cold War."
 -via http://spartacus-educational.com/USAjacksonCD.htm





Aspen Institute-type stuff:

"Wednesday at the Aspen Institute’s “Washington Ideas Forum,” Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said we are living through, “historic, defining times,” that will result in a, “new world order.”"

Hegel is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations:



"When questioned about the ongoing global chaos by the national correspondent for The Atlantic, James Fallows, Hagel said, “I think we are living through one of these historic, defining times. I think we are seeing a new world order.” "
- http://www.breitbart.com/video/2014/10/29/hagel-i-think-we-are-seeing-a-new-world-order/

To look at the larger picture that is formed here it is that big international investors have had their hands in the very same pie (Russia, Gazprom, etc.) that is now seen as the transgressor in an information war concerning Europe, Eastern Europe, the United States and others.

Ukraine is the current concern but that focus will soon shift as it always does.

The spin that is given to the information is that RT, Putin & Co. are saying that it is all a conspiracy and this must be countered with objective reporting from Western media (along with implied censorship of the internet because of all the "extremism" it produces, by "little people who should only speak when spoken to").

Think about the level of investing by foreign interests in Russian companies. The ones who need to be eliminated by the West AND the East are the mid-level people who see the changes happening within. These people must be made to think it is all coming from an external source and not understand their own leaders are all in on it.

It is far easier to have someone from the outside eliminate your enemies on the inside while you get to look like the hero defending.