Putin: "Crimea [river, cry me a sea!]" (video)

Amber Larson, Seven, Wisdom Quarterly; Sergei L. Loiko (LAT); Amy Goodman (DN!); FEMEN

Femen sexstremists spur Ukrainian Revolution with Tymoshenko braids (femen.org)

Authoritarian Russian KGB/President Vlad Putin faces off with young, topless FEMEN demonstrator as European leaders, including Germany's Angela Merkel, shrink and cower.

 

Who is provoking unrest in Ukraine? Role of USA (CIA) and Russia

 

Russia is vowing to keep its troops in the Ukrainian region of Crimea in what has become Moscow’s biggest confrontation with the West since the Cold War. Ukraine’s new prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, said Pres. Putin had effectively declared war on his country. Concern is growing that more of eastern Ukraine could soon fall to the Russians. Earlier today, Russian troops seized a Ukraine coast guard base in the Crimean city of Balaklava.

 

On Sunday, the new head of Ukraine’s navy defected to Russia. To talk more about the crisis in Ukraine, Democracy Now! spoke to Yale history professor Timothy Snyder. His latest article for The New York Review of Books is "Ukraine: The Haze of Propaganda." DN also spoke to retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern. He focused on Russian foreign policy for the first decade of his 27-year career with the agency and recently wrote an article titled "Ukraine: One 'Regime Change' Too Many?" More

Russians invading Crimea, Ukraine

Anti-Putin protests, EU consulate (FEMEN)

BAKHCHISARAI, Ukraine - The tense military standoff in Crimea continued today as Ukraine’s army and naval forces were blockaded by invading Russian troops and supporters, at some sites demanding that the Ukrainian units surrender their bases and swear allegiance to the Kremlin and Russia’s armed forces.

The demand represented an alarming sign that the fresh Russian forces had come here to stay, some analysts said.

Stop Putin. Ukraine must be free! (FEMEN)

“The fact that Russians openly demand that Ukrainian officers and soldiers in the Crimea take a military oath to Russia may mean one thing: The Kremlin intends to keep them here for a long time, if not for good,” said Kost Bondarenko, head of the Ukrainian Policy Institute, a think-tank based in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev.

“It means that Ukraine is steadily losing the Crimea to Russia, and it will be extremely difficult to get it back as the Ukrainian army is incapable of opposing Russia," he said. More

VENEZUELA: Tens of thousands march in anti-government protests

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The war to come in Kiev, Ukraine (video)

Editors, Wisdom Quarterly; BBC.co.uk; FEMEN.org; Los Angeles Times  UPDATED

There have been sporadic clashes through the day, as BBC's Duncan Crawford reports.

Putin says it's time for a police state in Kiev, and Ukraine president says sir, yes, sir!

 

Protesters momentarily get the upper hand.

Paramilitary police clashed with anti-government protesters in the center of Kiev on Feb. 18. State-sanctioned violence has left at least 100 citizens dead. Police snipers shot at protesters heads to bring them down with single wounds to the head; phalanxes of police have been firing shotguns into crowds; undercover police have been executing citizens; and military-armed police are firing deadly cannon-like rubber munitions at stone-throwing protesters near Ukraine's parliament.

Mind your own business, America!

Police also attacked civilians with smoke bombs and water cannons after protesters hurled paving stones as they sought to get closer to the heavily-fortified parliament building. Reports state that protesters have captured 64 police agents. See extensive coverage at KyivPost.com, but be forewarned it is sympathetic to murderous police and government shot callers.
 

FEMEN activist/topless protester for Kiev

Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has fired the head of the armed forces, Col. Gen. Volodymyr Zamana, according to the president's website.

  Reports

The move comes after the most intense violence in [former Soviet state] Ukraine's three-month crisis turned the capital of Kiev into a battle zone against civilians.

Ukraine is "going West," joining European Economic Union over Russia (femen.org)

 

Earlier the state security service announced it was launching a nationwide "anti-terrorist" [terrorist = protester] campaign, to deal with a growing "extremist threat."

 

F you, dictator Putin (femen.org/en)

There was a suggestion the armed forces could be deployed for the first time [to help the paramilitary police kill more civilian civil rights protesters]. Col. Gen. Zamana has been replaced by the commander of Ukraine's Navy, Admiral Yuriy Ilyin, by presidential decree, President Yanukovych's website said. [One military man for another, that ought to lead to peace and calm.] More + VIDEO

• Live news (BBC) - Pictures - Crisis explained - Timeline

Ukrainian protest fires burn in capital of Kiev after police kill protesters (BBC)

 

This war began long ago

You don't talk like that, young lady!

(FEMEN.org) KIEV, Ukraine - "Ukraine is not Alina." FEMEN has long protested Russian Dictator Putin's intervention in the affairs of the Ukraine. FEMEN fought against electoral fraud during the elections to the Duma. In 2012 at polling station where operatives were "stealing for Putin!" FEMEN activists tried to take the voice of Putin during Russian presidential voting. "Putin is the Apocalypse"! In 2013 in Germany FEMEN said, "F*ck you, Putin!" As for Kiev at the Russian Embassy, it's "Forward Russia. More

Pussy Riot beaten and whipped in Sochi
August Brown (AP/latimes.com, Feb. 19, 2014)

Pussy Riot in Sochi in balacavas (latimes.com)

Mere days after police detained them in Sochi, Russia, Nadya Tolokonnikova, Masha Alyokhina, and other members of Pussy Riot were attacked by whip-wielding Cossacks in Sochi today, according to reports.
 

According to The Guardian (UK) and other outlets, members of the punk feminist activist group had assembled in their iconic bright balaclavas [knitted face scarves] in an area about 20 miles from the site of the Winter Olympics.
 

Senator McCain meddling for US

As they prepared to play a new song, "Putin Will Teach You to Love the Motherland," they were surrounded by plainclothes security officers.

There were also surrounded by uniformed Cossacks with whips, who were enlisted as an informal security force during the Sochi Games.
 
Cossacks, an equestrian-focused rural Russian culture,  have re-emerged as a symbol of conservative and militaristic values during Putin's presidency [a.k.a. dictatorship]. More

Deadliest Day in Ukraine Protests
Victoria Butenko and Carol J. Williams (latimes.com, Feb. 18, 2014)

Hundreds of thousands of protesters in streets

KIEV, Ukraine - At least nine people were killed yesterday [Feb. 17th] in the deadliest day of the 3-month-old Ukrainian political crisis.

[Paramilitary police attacked] demonstrators and later stormed their encampment at Kiev's Independence Square, the Maidan, local and international media reported.

Live television coverage carried by the Russia-24 news channel and nine live-streaming video cameras at the protest site and relayed by Ukrainian opposition broadcasters showed fiery explosions illuminating the grimy tent city in the capital after demonstrators ignored a [threat] from police to clear the square.

Ukrainians see their president as "traitor"

[WHY? It seems Russian Dictator or Presisenty Putin has ordered Ukraine's President. Yanukovich to severely crack down on Ukrainian demonstrators -- with military weaponry, forces, snipers, and plain clothes assassins -- to stop drawing attention to the plight of Ukraine and away from nearby Sochi, where Russia is trying to host a glorious Winter Olympics.]

Clouds of smoke from fires and tear gas could be seen wafting over the chaotic scene, eerily backlit with an orange glow from the multitude of blasts, burning sandbags, and smoldering debris.

Protest action in Moscow (Denis Bochkarev)

[Paramilitary police] forces began moving against the protesters' camp with water cannons and stun grenades after giving them 15 minutes' warning to leave.

But thousands of protesters remained in the square despite the caustic gas engulfing the nerve center of the uprising against President Viktor Yanukovich. More

Full coverage
(Los Angeles Times)

At least two dead as Ukraine protests rage: The crowd, many wearing helmets and brandishing homemade shields and wooden sticks, responded with a roar.

  
Ukraine uprising erupts in killings, arson, raids
He also accused two top U.S. diplomats -- Victoria Nuland, who oversees European affairs at the State Department... before Tuesday's violent eruption.

Ukrainians see worrisome nationalistic elements among protesters
...oppose the revolution spreading like wildfire across the country," he said. "We can take any ministry, any court, any agency in Kiev today, and no one can prevent us."

Ukraine president offers prime minister post to opposition leader
...year driver from the town of Obukhov near Kiev, said as [he] set fire to a piece of cloth in the neck of a beer bottle that was flung toward the police a second later. 

Ukraine protesters reject deal with president
...ground floor of the Agriculture Ministry next to Independence Square [Maidan] and captured the building, the UNIAN information agency reported. 

Ukraine demonstrators clash with riot police
...I decided not to go to Grushevsky [Street] because by our presence we can only aggravate the provocation which is taking place there now."
Why is John McCain meddling in Ukraine?

Revolution: East and West (Ukraine, Thailand)

Amber Larson, Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; FEMEN.org/en; BBC.co.uk

The EuroMaidens for freedom in Ukraine, Baltic states, and worldwide (femen.org)

Thailand wants a people's coup, as does Ukraine, and Pussy Riot wants to protect prisoners

  

FEMEN (feminist topless protest collective) started its fight with the dictatorship in Ukraine, a former member of the Soviet Union now leaning in favor of joining the West through the European Union, four years ago. Now FEMEN's brothers are making a revolution and it appeals to the world for help. Ukrainians need our support! Revolution cannot be stopped! Ukraine must be cleansed of its dictatorship! Together we will win this fight -- and with it the struggle against sexism (patriarchal systems, bias based on gender or biological sex), racism, and extreme class divisions. 

Gov't panel: NSA's bulk collection of phone records is ILLEGAL

An independent congressional panel has concluded the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of phone records is illegal. In a new report, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board says the NSA program should be brought to an end, is illegal, and has had only minimal benefits in stopping any kind of "terrorism." 

(Tom Tomorrow/thismodernworld.com)

The panel says the program "lacks a viable legal foundation under [PATRIOT Act] Section 215, implicates constitutional concerns under the First and Fourth Amendments [about intrusions into our privacy, searches, and seizures], raises serious threats to privacy and civil liberties as a policy matter, and has shown only limited value, adding: "The board recommends that the government end the program." President Obama said last week he intends to reform the bulk collection, but his plan would preserve it.

NSA-GCHQ Snowden leaks: Glossary of key terms

When The Guardian and Washington Post newspapers published the first of Edward Snowden's NSA-GCHQ leaks in June, it unleashed a stream of abbreviations...

• NSA "gets data from Angry Birds"
• "How to hide from surveillance" (BBC)
• U.S. State of the Union: Is anyone listening?
• US makes Bitcoin exchange arrests
• No gay people in Sochi, says mayor
• Looks of early European revealed
• Farting cows cause Germany explosion
• Pope John Paul II relic stolen

Sextremism: FEMEN means death for patriarchy (sexist male domination)

 

Ukraine to scrap anti-protest laws

(BBC.co.uk, Jan. 27, 2014)

Police state (Sergei L. Loiko/latimes.com)

The Ukrainian president and opposition leaders have agreed to scrap anti-protest laws that had fueled anger at the government, the presidency says.

 

Pres. Viktor Yanukovych also offered an amnesty to protesters, but only if they cleared barricades and stopped attacking government buildings. The president made the offer in talks with the three main opposition leaders.

 

The demonstrators had demanded the protest law be repealed, but they also want Mr. Yanukovych [who is accused of being a traitor who is selling out Ukraine to Putin and Russia] to quit.

 

The law was hastily passed in parliament by Yanukovych loyalists on 16 January. The changes included a ban on unauthorized tents in public areas [, a ban on wearing protective helmets or masks], and criminal responsibility for slandering government officials. 

 

Correspondents say it is likely to be overturned during a special session of parliament on Tuesday, arranged last week to discuss the crisis.

 

Unrest spreads east

The [anti-protest] law angered protesters and helped to spread unrest across Ukraine, even to Mr. Yanukovych's Russian-speaking strongholds in the east. The protesters, closely allied to the opposition parties, targeted government buildings and have briefly occupied several ministries in Kiev. More Watershed moment - Who are the protest leaders? - Media: Point of no return? - Q&A: What's behind crisis?

 

Thailand's Red Shirts vs. Yellow: People's Coup

Red: leftwing, Yellow: rightwing

(BBC, Jan. 26, 2014) BANGKOK, Thailand - Protesters block early election vote. They have surrounded polling stations, blocking early voting ahead of next week's [hastily convened] general election, officials say. [Street demonstrations are bringing down Thailand's first female prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, sister of corrupt billionaire and former Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra, who pulled her strings.] Meanwhile, one opposition leader was shot dead as he addressed a crowd at a rally outside a polling station in east Bangkok where advance voting was supposed to take place. Jonathan Head reports from Bangkok. More + VIDEO

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Ukraine: Demonstrators flood Kiev for EU deal

Amber Larson, Pat Macpherson, Wisdom Quarterly; Oksana Grytsenko in Kiev (Nov. 24), Shaun Walker and Oksana Grytsenko (theguardian.com, Dec. 15, 2013); FEMEN.org/en

The biggest demonstrations since the "Orange Revolution" are continuing in the Ukraine after Pres. Viktor Yanukovych allegedly aborted a trade deal with the European Union under Russian pressure to stick with the former USSR. 

Tens of thousands of Ukrainians have flooded the streets of Kiev in the biggest anti-government protest since the 2004 Orange Revolution to demand President Viktor Yanukovych reverse a decision not to sign a key pact with the European Union. 

Ukrainian Nordic beauty, human-deva hybrids?

The rally, which may herald the most serious challenge to Yanukovych's authority since he came to power in 2010, ended with scuffles with police outside government offices.

Police [reacted] with teargas. Ukraine was to have signed a historic free trade and association deal with the EU at this week's Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. EU officials said Ukraine's abrupt U-turn came as a result of Kremlin pressure.

Riot police clash with Ukrainians near the cabinet building in Kiev (Alexey Furman/EPA)

 

Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, wants Kiev to join a Moscow-led customs union. [Allegedly] an estimated 45% of Ukraine's population support closer ties with the West instead.

 

Ukraine president is unpopular

"We want to be in Europe" said 46-year-old Liudmyla Babych, a saleswoman from Kiev, holding a placard reading, "Mr. President – the Ukrainian nation will not forgive you this treason."

 

The protesters marched through the streets of Kiev as part of a nationwide day of protest chanting the slogans "Out with the gang!" and "Ukraine is Europe" and singing songs popular during the Orange revolution. Tens of thousands of people held a peaceful meeting on... More

Who rules the Ukraine, people or gov't?

Wisdom Quarterly (COMMENTARY)

FEMEN stands against dictators in Ukraine

That was the headline in November. By the middle of December, the sides had grown in intensity. The police and politicians are conservatives, the people radicals for change -- greater trade and affiliation with the West. The EU versus RU (Russia, or what's left of the USSR), who will win the hearts and minds of the Ukrainians?

Oops, it's already been won by the EU. That will not stop Vlad Putin from putting inordinate pressure on its president to remain a Russian ally -- even if it means a massive and bloody police state intervention. Paramilitary police and secret forces are already on the scene beating civilians, deploying teargas, and planning for a major crackdown. People can simply not be allowed the delusion that their voice matters. When it comes to governing a modern "democracy," what matters most is what those tricky enough to rig elections decide. 

Ukraine protesters return en masse to central Kiev for pro-EU campaign

Shaun Walker and Oksana Grytsenko (theguardian.com)

Kiev, Dec. 15, 2013 (theguardian.com)

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians brave freezing weather to demand EU integration despite suspension of negotiations on the agreement due to Russian interference.
 
Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians braved freezing temperatures and aggressive [paramilitary] policing to return to central Kiev on Sunday to demand political change, sending a message to authorities that the crisis over the government's failure to sign an EU integration pact is unlikely to end soon.

With the news that the EU has suspended negotiations on the agreement likely to further inflame the mood, at least 200,000 people packed into Independence Square, known as the Maidan, to hear music and speeches from the trio of Ukrainian politicians who have attempted to lead the spontaneous outpouring of anger. More

Iceland liberates itself from its gov't (video)

Ashley Wells, Pat Macpherson, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly

(The R.E.A.L. Institute - Max Bliss) The people of Iceland forced their corrupt government to resign. A citizens' assembly was created to rewrite the constitution. The banks were nationalized, and it was decided not to pay debt PRIVATE banks created. All of this was accomplished peacefully. What would happen if the rest of the world followed this example?

In spite of a wall of silence by the American mainstream media, Icelanders took to the street and ousted everyone from its government, forcing all members to resign. Ask your relatives in Iceland, because you won't be hearing about it on the US evening news.

 

The unprecedented move followed the worst financial crisis the world had ever seen, which in 2008 set motion the worldwide bank and real estate crises. It all began in relatively safe and isolated Icelandic banking system, which are nevertheless connected to the Euro zone system.

 

(TYT) Ron Paul: Iceland dismantles corrupt gov't then arrests all

Rothschild bankers. Iceland was right; we were wrong: The IMF

Bjork loves her Scandinavian homeland

Iceland, a green wonderland and home of Bjork (apparently its main export), took to the streets and peacefully replaced the incompetent government and took to rewriting its constitution in a citizens' referendum. Government agents may have colluded with bankers and high finance traders to enrich themselves personally. That will have to be worked out later if ever. In the meantime, Iceland gets a fresh starts. World governments seem terrified that anyone find out that such a thing is possible.

Iceland is closer than most Europeans think and far stranger than anyone imagines. Over the millennia, glaciers, erosion, and tectonic movement have shaped the land. Winter is amazing as white snow accentuates black lava fields and the dark sky is suddenly disturbed by dancing, flickering veils of Northern Lights. In spring the sun climbs ever higher, warming the earth, and the green vegetation turns a picturesque red, yellow, or brown. It is a paradise for bird watchers. Látrabjarg in the West Fjords is the largest birdcliff in the known world. Iceland is among the 10 best destinations for whale and dolphin watching just offshore in the Grundar fjord and Kolgrafar fjord on the north coast of the Snaefellsnes peninsula.

 

Bloody coups and deposings (depositions?) are the norm in the history we hear. If such a thing were known to have taken place peacefully and by popular revolt -- which was easier in Iceland with its small, homogenous, and unified population -- citizens or libertarians might get the idea to "occupy" their capitals.

Is there a movement across the globe? The Ukraine, formerly a part of Scandinavian Finland and Russia, wants to join the Euro zone. Russia will not stand for it. The solution? A long standing protest and demonstration continues in the Ukraine. Lenin statue toppled in symbolic challenge to Ukrainian government.

• AUDIO: Lenin deposed in Kiev, Ukraine (The World) Ukrainian protesters took down Vlad Lenin in Kiev over the weekend. It has been more than 20 years since the break up of the USSR, so it is kind of surprising that it was still there.

"Compassion is revolution" (GR)

Buddhist Thailand is discontented with its government, the Yingluck Shinawatra adminstration, while still loving its king (who is no more involved with actual governing than the British monarchy is seen to fiddle with the country's Parliament). The solution? A long standing protest and demonstration continues in Bangkok and is growing beyond the capital. This is part of an older direct action between Red Shirts (radicals) and Yellow Shirts (reactionaries).

Now Singapore, an idyllic police state in Asia, is being rocked by an unexpected series of protests. This is unheard of in modern Singapore, an economic powerhouse that traded its civil liberties for order and productivity. But it did once happen in the sixties. Singapore shocked by worst riots since 1969.

Psychotic DARPA Dr. Regina Dugan aims to "chip" everyone (Google)

Headlines as we lose our freedoms

• Recording brain activity could lead to mind-reading devices (The Almagest) Dr. Josef Parvizi: "We're now able to eavesdrop on the brain in real life."
• IRS using Google Maps to spy on taxpayers Agents from the Internal Revenue Service are using Google Maps as part of their tool kit to audit taxpayers and organizations.
• Company develops real-life RoboCop Knightscope has invented a futuristic autonomous robot that is able to predict and prevent crime. 
• Vast freshwater reserves discovered under the ocean floor (Daily Mail) Australian researchers have discovered vast freshwater reserves beneath the seabed which they believe could sustain future generations.
• Send wireless power long range with lasers and balloons An idea for beaming power over hundreds of miles could help provide emergency power where it is needed.

USA (NSA) spying on Europe (video)

CC Liu, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly; Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez, DemocracyNow.org

Barry Obama and Sec'y of State John Kerry on drones and spying (economist.com)

American activists gather in Washington, D.C. protesting NSA's illegal activities. Democrat Diane Feinstein, who chairs a congressional committee overseeing America's (known) spying apparatus, plans new legislation to shut down protesters by making NSA spying legal (DN).

 

The Empire is at it again, and it only gets worse with every revelation of intrusive homeland spying, Internet monitoring, and cellphone (mobile) wiretapping. The NSA has been doing it to the nation's allies in Europe as well.

 

  

(10-28-13) As new revelations of NSA (National Security Agency) spying stoke the ire of Germany, France, and Spain [and other Eurozone countries], thousands of infuriated Americans marched on Washington, D.C., on Saturday in a rally against government surveillance. Organizers say the protest was the largest to date against NSA monitoring since Edward Snowden’s disclosures became public through Glenn Greenwald and the UK's The Guardian in June.

Journalist Glenn Greenwald

Jesselyn Radack, a former Justice Department lawyer who now works for the Government Accountability Project reads a message from Edward Snowden; NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake, who was charged with espionage after he was suspected of revealing information about the agency’s warrantless wiretapping program, also speaks. And New Mexico’s former Republican governor, Gary Johnson, chimes in. More

• Reports: NSA spying on Germany since 2002; Obama briefed in 2010 
  
• Report: NSA illegally tracked millions of calls in Spain 
• 1000s of Americans march against NSA surveillance in D.C.
• VIDEO: Glenn Greenwald: U.S. spying on allies shows "institutional obsession" with surveillance (and no concern for constitution or international agreements) 
• Journalist Glenn Greenwald's new job after The Guardian: [E-Bay founder funds new] media venture to empower adversarial journalism and thereby hold the powerful accountable