5 Sober Date Ideas That Will Help You Kick Loneliness This Winter - By Kelly Burch

5 Sober Date Ideas That Will Help You Kick Loneliness This Winter

By Kelly Burch

Today, dating should be easy. We have apps that can find us a date with the push of a button, and matching with people who share your interests is easier than ever. Despite that, it seems Americans are struggling to make meaningful connections. About half of Americans report feeling lonely or left out, something that can be exacerbated by the bad weather and short days of the winter season. 

As we know, feeling isolated and alone can undermine your sobriety and put you at risk of relapse. If you’re past that critical first year, dating can be a great way to build connections and meet new people, especially if you remove the pressure and approach it as a way to have fun. Even if you already have a significant other, taking each other on dates is a great way to reconnect and reignite your passion in a healthy way. 

Although many people rely on liquid courage to cope with the awkwardness of a date, Mike Reed, the founder of Single and Sober, says that sober dates are the best kind. People who are in recovery can fall back on easy date ideas like grabbing a drink. Instead of seeing this as a pitfall, Reed says that people in recovery have a unique opportunity to jump right into more desirable dates that lead to longterm connection. 

Here are 5 sober date night ideas that you’ll love, whether you’re connecting with someone new or rediscovering your partner in a whole new light. 

Get Moving

Too often, dates involve sitting around and talking. While that might sound nice in theory, it’s a lot of pressure to keep the conversation flowing while you sit with someone you might not know very well, or to make new conversation with a partner who you talk to each and every day. To break the monotony of dining together, opt for a date that will get you moving. Being active releases all sorts of feel-good chemicals, and is an important part of recovery for many people. Movement is especially important during the winter, when most of us spend more time than we would like to cooped up inside. 

Struggling to think of a fun, active date activity? Think about the things that you used to love to do when you were a kid. If you live in a cold climate go ice skating or sledding. It might sound silly, but soon you’ll be laughing so much you won’t mind. If it’s warmer opt for rollerblading or mini-golf. The key is to choose something that is a novelty and that will provide entertainment to cut down on those dreaded awkward silences. Just make sure your date knows what to expect so he or she can dress appropriately!

Go To A Reading

Not ready to let your date see how uncoordinated you are? That’s ok. Instead of connecting with your inner child, take a more sophisticated option by bringing your date to a lecture, book reading or poetry slam. Local book stores, libraries and universities offer these events regularly, and they’re often free. 

Now, no one wants to be bored to tears, so try to choose an event that is relatively short in case it’s less interesting than you were hoping. No matter what, you’ll have good conversation material for coffee or dessert afterward, whether you’re debating the topics brought up or laughing at the whole experience.  

Mosey Through A Museum

Oftentimes you’re working around the weather when you’re planning dates during the winter. Museums are a great option, since there’s always something new to see and no pressure to drink. When you’re choosing a museum think about what you want from your date: art and history museums often offer new exhibits and a lot of time for quiet contemplation. Science museums or aquariums can be a bit more lively, allowing you to infuse a bit of fun into your date. 

Dare To Dance

Many people who are sober aren’t comfortable in the nightclub scene, where drugs and alcohol are so prevalent. At the same time, lots of sober people have fond memories of music and dancing. Reconnect with your inner dancing queen (or king) by taking Ballroom or Latin dance lessons with your date. Most dance schools offer drop-in nights for beginners, where you won’t be the only couple who feels like they have two left-feet. If you try a drop-in night and have fun, sign up for ongoing classes and enjoy the thrill of watching your moves improve week after week. 

Get Cooking

When it’s cold outside there’s something affirming (and sexy!) about spending time in the kitchen. Cooking together is a great date, since you’re working together to make something that you’ll both enjoy later. Add in some music and you can have as much or as little conversation as you like. 

If you’re going on a date with someone new, try a cooking class. Restaurants, co-ops and cooking schools all offer drop-in classes covering a variety of cuisines. If you’re more comfortable together, invite your date to cook a new recipe at your place and enjoy a date night in. 

Dating while sober can be intimidating, but connecting with sober dating resources and experimenting with different date options can open up a whole new world of connection. 

Want more sober date ideas? Check out the sober dating tips on Single and Sober.

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White Priviledge In Children's Books Challenged by Children's Literature Justice Brigades

Can diversity in children's books tackle prejudice?

By Katy Scott, CNN

October 23, 2018

Story highlights

• Campaigners hope to encourage diversity in children's books
• Typecasting common in kid's literature, analysts say

(CNN)Marley Dias says she was tired of reading books about "white boys and their dogs" in school.

So at the age of 11, she launched the campaign #1000BlackGirlBooks to identify books featuring people of color as protagonists. Over the past three years, Dias has collected more than 11,000 books. She is in the process of donating all the books and has given more than half to what she describes as "predominantly black and underserved" communities in the US, Haiti, Ghana, Jamaica and the UK.

The young activist from New Jersey has even gone on to author her own book -- "Marley Dias Gets It Done" -- and is currently developing an app so kids can find "black girl books" more easily.

Marley Dias, the brains behind #1000 Black Girl Books.

"I hope that my campaign will mean more opportunities for our stories to be told and for books with black girls as the main character to be put on bookshelves worldwide," she tells CNN.

Yet despite the young writer's best efforts, statistics suggest "black girl books" are still in short supply. Just 9% of children's books published in the US in 2017 featured African or African American characters -- according to data from the Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC) which has been measuring representation in children's books since 1985.

While that figure appears small, it actually represents an improvement on previous years. In 2014, just 5% of children's books recorded by the CCBC included African or African American characters. Moreover, CCBC director Kathleen Horning points out that many of the books about black experiences have not been written by authors from that demographic.

Africans and African Americans wrote or illustrated just 3% of the books counted by the CCBC in 2017. Horning says this statistic appears to depict how difficult it can be for black authors to break into the publishing industry. When children's books about black people do get published, Horning says they often fall into three broad categories: books about slavery, books set during the civil rights movement and books that tell "gritty, contemporary" stories about children growing up in struggling families or teens dealing with violence. "All of these are important stories, but young readers also want more variety," says Horning. For example, there aren't traditionally "many fantasies with African American characters, or books showing a middle-class black family."

However, Horning adds she has seen flickers of change in 2018, highlighting fantasy book "Children of Blood and Bone" by Toni Adeyemi and "Pride" by Ibi Zoboi, a contemporary remix of "Pride and Prejudice," featuring a Haitian-Dominican-American family.

Tackling typecast

Others point out that typecasting in children's novels isn't an issue exclusive to the black community.

B.J. Epstein, a lecturer in children's literature at the University of East Anglia in the UK, notes that diverse characters are often pigeonholed by their ethnicity, race, religion, disability or sexual orientation. In her book "Are the Kids All Right?: Representations of LGBTQ Characters in Children's and Young Adult Literature," Epstein surveyed English books with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender characters. She found the majority of stories dealing with this subject only highlighted the difficulty of coming out, and the negative repercussions associated with doing so.

Character development

The consequences of a lack of diverse characters can extend well beyond the classroom.

"The stories that children read at a young age tell them who matters and who doesn't matter, who's human and who isn't human," explains Philip Nel, professor of English at Kansas State University.

"A story doesn't have to tell us that explicitly. It can tell us that by failing to represent certain groups of people -- omission tells us that these groups of people are not important," Nel adds.

Philip Nel is the author of "Was the Cat in the Hat Black?: The Hidden Racism of Children's Literature, and the Need for Diverse Books." Pictured here, Michelle Obama reads "Cat in the Hat" to a group of children.

Some classic books still taught in schools contain language and storylines that would be considered overtly racist by today's standards. But Nel argues that the answer isn't simply removing "problematic" children's classics like Mark Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," which uses the N-word 219 times, from school reading lists. Such stories, "if used carefully, appropriately and in context can be a way to educate people about racism," he says.

Teaching problematic children's classics can allow children of color to critique and disagree with a book, express anger at oppression and find the language to talk about racism while also teaching white children to identify racist ways of thinking and challenge their own racialized assumptions, Nel explains. However, he also stressed how critical it was to introduce diverse books in the classroom to provide necessary context.

This is important, particularly in countries like the US, given that approximately 50% of public elementary and secondary school children are non-white, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics.

Stories tell children "who's human and who isn't human," says Nel.

Turning the page

According to Horning, the publishing industry desperately needs to diversify.

The 2015 Diversity Baseline Survey of staff at 34 American publishers found 79% of staff to be white. Publishing groups have sought to address the issue through inclusivity trackers and targets, diversity hiring committees, and mentoring schemes to get people of color into the workforce.

Many publishers also have specific imprints focusing on diverse books for children and young adults.

But it is not only publishers who are responsible for the lack of diverse authors and characters in children's books.

"I think the umbrella here is the adult attitudes have to change," says Horning. "Librarians, teachers and parents have a responsibility to expose children to a wide range of books, and not just channel them into books where they only see themselves reflected."

Epstein agrees that while the industry needs to reform, it is up to teachers and parents to think about the values and morals they pass on to children through the books they read. "We owe it to our children and to the world they will shape to really think consciously about the books that are available to them," she says.

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Let's Boycott Israel and Its Friends - If you want change, begin to play hardball - by Philip Giraldi • 18 Dec 2018

 

In his recent article “Averting World Conflict with China” Ron Unz has come up with an intriguing suggestion for the Chinese government to turn the tables on the December 1^st arrest of Meng Wanzhou in Canada. Canada detained Mrs. Meng, CFO of the world’s largest telecoms equipment manufacturer Huawei, at the request of the United States so she could be extradited to New York to face charges that she and her company had violated U.S. sanctions on Iran. The sanctions in question had been imposed unilaterally by Washington and it is widely believed that the Trump Administration is sending a signal that when the ban on purchasing oil from Iran comes into full effect in May there will be no excuses accepted from any country that is unwilling to comply with the U.S. government’s demands. Washington will exercise universal jurisdiction over those who violate its sanctions, meaning that foreign officials and heads of corporations that continue to deal with Iran can be arrested when traveling internationally and will be extradited to be tried in American courts.

There is, of course, a considerable downside to arresting a top executive of a leading foreign corporation from a country that is a major U.S. trading partner and which also, inter alia, holds a considerable portion of the U.S. national debt. Ron Unz has correctly noted the “…extraordinary gravity of this international incident and its potential for altering the course of world history.” One might add that Washington’s demands that other nations adhere to its sanctions on third countries opens up a Pandora’s box whereby no traveling executives will be considered safe from legal consequences when they do not adhere to policies being promoted by the United States. Unz cites Columbia’s Jeffrey Sachs as describing it as “almost a U.S. declaration of war on China’s business community.” If seizing and extraditing businessmen becomes the new normal those countries most affected will inevitably retaliate in kind. China has already detained two traveling Canadians to pressure Ottawa to release Mrs. Meng. Beijing is also contemplating some immediate retaliatory steps against Washington to include American companies operating in China if she is extradited to the U.S.

Ron Unz has suggested that Beijing might just want to execute a quid pro quo by pulling the licenses of Sheldon Adelson’s casinos operating in Macau, China and shutting them down, thereby eliminating a major source of his revenue. Why go after an Israeli-American casino operator rather than taking steps directly against the U.S. government? The answer is simple. Pressuring Washington is complicated as there are many players involved and unlikely to produce any positive results while Adelson is the prime mover on much of the Trump foreign policy, though one hesitates to refer to it as a policy at all.

Adelson is the world’s leading diaspora Israel-firster and he has the ear of the president of the United States, who reportedly speaks and meets with him regularly. And Adelson uses his considerable financial resources to back up his words of wisdom. He is the fifteenth wealthiest man in America with a reported fortune of $33 billion. He is the number one contributor to the GOP having given $81 million in the last cycle. Admittedly that is chump change to him, but it is more than enough to buy the money hungry and easily corruptible Republicans.

In a certain sense, Adelson has obtained control of the foreign policy of the political party that now controls both the White House and the Senate, and his mission in life is to advance Israeli interests. Among those interests is the continuous punishment of Iran, which does not threaten the United States in any way, through employment of increasingly savage sanctions and threats of violence, which brings us around to the arrest of Meng and the complicity of Adelson in that process. Adelson’s wholly owned talking head National Security Adviser John Bolton reportedly had prior knowledge of the Canadian plans and may have actually been complicit in their formulation. Adelson has also been the major force behind moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, has also convinced the Administration to stop its criticism of the illegal Israeli settlements on Arab land and has been instrumental in cutting off all humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. He prefers tough love when dealing with the Iranians, advocating dropping a nuclear bomb on Iran as a warning to the Mullahs of what more might be coming if they don’t comply with all the American and Israeli demands.

Meanwhile another Israeli, Haim Saban has performed similar work with the Democrats, contributing $5 million to their coffers, making him the top donor to the party. Saban has said that he is a “one issue guy, and my issue is Israel.”

Of course, one might reasonably argue that America’s problem with Jews who are passionately attached to Israel funding and controlling the major political parties is self-generated, that no one should be allowed to fund any political party to such an extent that one obtains control over policies. But that is an argument that will have to be directed at the Supreme Court, which permitted corporations to be treated as persons with its Citizens United ruling, allowing virtually unlimited money to flow into political PACs as a First Amendment right.

The lopsided wag-the-dog relationship with Israel is so dangerous to actual American interests in so many ways that the United States is now approaching a precipice and might soon find itself plummeting to ruin. Israel, not Russia, constantly interferes in the functioning of America’s remaining democracy. Fighting Israel’s wars and protecting it from any criticism have debased the value of being an American citizen and literally impoverished the country under a mountain of debt. The U.S. has been victimized by terrorism, much of which can be traced back to Israeli roots, and the Washington is now isolated globally as the United States has become more and more like Israel, a militarized state, politically corrupt and abandoning basic liberties.

How does one right the sinking ship? For starters, the Ron Unz formula for correcting the problem with China provides an excellent roadmap. Israel and its friends do not have a grip on congress, the White House and the media because they are wonderful warm people that others find to be sympathetic. It is difficult even to imagine a scintillating conversation with a malignant toad like Sheldon Adelson. Israel’s ability to corrupt and misdirect is all based on Jewish money, a process in which Zionist oligarchs buy their way to power and access. So the solution is to hit back where it really hurts – boycott Israel and Israeli products and do the same for the companies that are the sources of income for the American Jews who are the principal supporters of the Zionist project.

The United States Congress is currently moving to make it illegal to openly advocate boycotts of Israel or even to inquire about doing so, while 25 states have already also done the same to a greater or lesser extent. Last week a speech therapist in Texas was fired from a job she had held for nine years because she refused to sign an oath affirming that she would not boycott Israel. It is a measure of Jewish power in the U.S. that American politicians choose to provide cover for Israel’s misdeeds even if it means the end of the First Amendment and free speech. But punitive steps intended to intimidate any and all critics of Israel aside, there is no reason why consumers cannot exercise judgement over what they buy and what they are supporting through their spending. If you want to visit Las Vegas, by all means go, but don’t patronize the casinos and hotels owned by Sheldon Adelson, which include The Venetian and Sands Resort.

Democratic party major donor Haim Saban, meanwhile, is a producer of Hollywood children’s entertainment, including the lucrative Power Rangers. You can stop your children from watching his violent programming and tell the network’s advertisers why you are doing so. And then there are businessmen including Bernard Marcus, who is a co-founder of Home Depot and a major supporter of Israel, and Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots. No one really has to spend $1000 to go to a football game, particularly if the owner is a good friend of Benjamin Netanyahu, and if you need something for your home or are seeking entertainment, choose to spend your dollars somewhere else. Readers can do the homework for the businesses and services that they normally patronize. If outspoken advocates for Israel own the company, take your dollars elsewhere.

As it is nearly impossible in the United States to vote for a politician who is in any way critical of Israel, those who are opposed to the terrible damage that the Israelis and their domestic lobby are doing to the U.S. can instead vote with their purchasing power. It does not afford the same pleasure as “throwing the bums out,” but there will be considerable satisfaction in being able to strike back against a powerful lobby that is so hubristic and insensitive to any criticism that it has become completely tone deaf.

Apart from domestic considerations, observers have noted that Israeli treatment of the Palestinians has been worse than apartheid under South Africa yet South Africa was subjected to multiple boycotts and bans on its participation in international fora, to include even sporting competitions. It is past time to do the same to Israel, which has been shooting dead hundreds of unarmed Palestinians for months now without paying any price at all. Boycotting Israel internationally is a good start. It is non-violent and proportionate and it just might be an idea that will spread and finally bring about some payback for what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his cabal of war criminals have done and continue to do. As the end of 2018 approaches, it would be something to look forward to if 2019 just might turn out to be the year of the international Israel Boycott.

Archive - https://archive.is/uDfbC

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is www.councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is <a:inform@cnionline.org" title="mailto:inform@cnionline.org" href="mailto:inform@cnionline.org">inform@cnionline.org</a:inform@cnionline.org">.

'5 Eyes' English Speaking Allies Conspire Against Chinese Telecom Giant Huawei (LiveJournal) 14 Dec 2018

LiveJournal XenagogueVicene

Evidence has come to light that US operations against the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei and the arrest and detention of one of its top executives, Meng Wanzhou, to face criminal charges of fraud brought by the US Justice Department are the outcome of a coordinated campaign by the intelligence agencies of the so-called “Five Eyes” network.

According to a major report published in the Australian Financial Review (AFR) yesterday, the annual meeting of top intelligence officials from countries in the network—the US, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada—held last July decided to “co-ordinate banning” Huawei from 5G mobile phone networks.

The two-day meeting, held in the Canadian capital, Ottawa, decided that the intelligence chiefs should spend time publicly explaining “their concerns” about China.

In the months that followed “an unprecedented campaign” has been waged by the five members of the network “to block the tech giant Huawei from supplying equipment for their next-generation wireless networks” which has now led to the arrest of Meng in Canada.

On August 23, in one of his last acts as Australian prime minister before being deposed in an inner-party leadership coup, Malcolm Turnbull rang US President Trump to tell him that Huawei and another Chinese firm, ZTE, had been banned from the country’s 5G rollout. The basis of the decision was to exclude “vendors who are likely to be subject of extrajudicial directions from a foreign government.”

This was followed on October 29 by a speech by the director-general of the Australian Signals Directorate, Mike Burgess, in which, while not directly naming Huawei, he said the “stakes with 5G” could not be higher. It was the first public speech by the head of the organisation in its 70-year history.

The speech was followed seven days later by a decision of the New Zealand Labour government to ban Huawei from supplying 5G equipment to the phone company Spark.

The article then noted that on December 6, the head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), David Vigneault, who had hosted the Five Eyes meeting, delivered his first public speech warning of a security threat.

“CSIS has seen a trend of state-sponsored espionage in fields that are crucial to Canada’s ability to build and sustain a prosperous, knowledge-based economy,” he said, referencing artificial intelligence, quantum technology and 5G. China was not mentioned specifically but there was no doubt it was the target and Canada is expected to shortly announce a ban on Huawei and ZTE.
The day after the speech by his Canadian counterpart, the head of Britain’s MI6 addressed a meeting at St Andrews University in Scotland in which he warned that “much of the evolving state threat is about our opponents’ innovative exploitation of modern technology.”

The British situation is more complex than that of the other Five Eyes members because of the agreement reached by British Telecom (BT) to partner with Huawei in the 3G and 4G networks 15 years ago. But that is changing as BT has said it will strip out Huawei equipment from its networks and will not use its technology in 5G.

The key attendee at the meeting was CIA director Gina Haspel. The US has been leading the push against China, has already banned Huawei and has been waging an international campaign to have its equipment banned by other strategic allies beyond the Five Eyes group.

The AFR article noted that the sharp focus of Washington on Beijing “plays into Trump’s obsession with trade war but it would be wrong to think it’s solely driven by the president. Over the last two years Republicans and Democrats in Congress and the departments of Defence, State and the security agencies have come to the conclusion China is a strategic threat.”
Other evidence of the way in which the US intelligence and military apparatus is driving the attack on Huawei and Chinese technology companies more broadly has been revealed in an article published in the Financial Times yesterday.

It cited a leaked memo, “apparently written by a senior National Security Council official” warning about the implications of the rise of Huawei to become the world’s biggest supplier of telecommunications equipment and that it was leading the field in the development of 5G.
“We are losing it,” the memo said. “Whoever leads in technology and market share for 5G deployment will have a tremendous advantage towards … commanding the heights of the information domain.”

The memo said 5G was “by no means simply a ‘faster 4G’” but was “a change more like the invention of the Gutenberg press” as it would bring faster speeds, lower lead times between the network and the device and had a much larger capacity to transfer data.
These developments, the article said, will underpin self-driving cars, artificial intelligence and machine-to-machine communications, and will “transform the way everything from hospitals to factories operate.”

China was far ahead in preparing for 5G which requires more base stations than existing networks and had almost 2 million cell sites in early 2018, ten times the number in the US. According to the Deloitte consultancy there are 5.3 sites for every 10 square miles in China compared to 0.4 in the US.
These figures make clear the reason for the ferocity of the US economic war against China. It fears that its economic and military supremacy is under direct threat and is determined to take all measures considered necessary to counter China’s rise.

The objective logic of this development was underlined in an article, also published in the AFR yesterday, by Columbia University professor Jeffrey Sachs.

The arrest of Meng Wanzhou, he wrote, “is a dangerous move by US President Donald Trump’s administration in its intensifying conflict with China. If, as Mark Twain reputedly said, history often rhymes, our era increasingly recalls the period preceding 1914. As with Europe’s great powers back then, the United States, led by an administration intent on asserting America’s dominance over China, is pushing the world towards disaster.”

Sachs drew attention to the hypocrisy surrounding the detention of Meng on charges of committing fraud in breach of US-imposed bans on dealing with Iran. He noted that in 2011 JP Morgan Chase paid $88.3 million in fines for violating US sanctions against Cuba, Iran and Sudan. “Yet [CEO] Jamie Dimon wasn’t grabbed off a plane and whisked into custody.”

None of the heads of banks or their financial officers was “held accountable for the pervasive law-breaking in the lead-up to or aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis” for which the banks paid $243 billion in fines.
The US actions against Huawei were part of an “economic war on China, and a reckless one.”
He noted that when global trade rules obstruct the “gangster tactics” of the Trump administration then it deems the rules have to go, citing a comment by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Brussels last week in which he admitted as much.

“Our administration,” Pompeo said, “is lawfully exiting or renegotiating outdated or harmful treaties, trade agreements and other international arrangements that don’t serve our sovereign interests, or the interests of our allies.”

Pointing to the unilateral decision of the US to reject the decision of the UN Security Council to lift all bans on Iran as part of the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement, Sachs concluded: “The Trump administration, not Huawei or China is the greatest threat to the international rule of law, and therefore to global peace.”

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Vermont Recycle Scrap Yard Owner Erects Giant Middle-Finger Sculpture Taunts WestfordTown Officials By Adam Frisk (LiveJournal) 13 Dec 2018

https://xenagoguevicene.livejournal.com/123410.html

ABOVE: Middle-finger statue baffles onlookers in Vermont town

A Vermont man, involved in a long-running spat with local officials, erected a giant sculpture of the middle finger saluting city council with the one-finger wave. Ted Pelkey owns a recycle business and a fleet of trucks to haul the waste.  Pelkey bought property in Westford planning to move his recycle waste yard to the town and also set up a truck repair station on the site. But, the town had regulations that resticted what kind of use the property could be put to.  The town officials did not want a recycle dump in the town.

Ted Pelkey had the sculpture erected next to a highway in the town of Westford earlier this month. “It’s intended for the people who run the town of Westford,” Pelkey told WCAX-TV.  The statue does not have any written message that indicates who the finger is aimed at.  

According to the news station, Pelkey has been in a long-running dispute with the town over red tape that’s preventing him from developing on his property. The man wants to move his recycling business and a truck repair shop from another town to his property to cut down on expenses. Pelkey claims city staff have a personal grudge against him and are creating red tape.

“In my eyes, if somebody tells you they hate you right up front, it’s a hate crime,” Pelkey said to WCAX-TV.



Pelkey spent $4,000 to commission the giant wooden middle finger.

“I’m hoping we can get it through to the people in the town of Westford to have a really long look at the people who are running their town,” Pelkey said.  As to how his personal problems affect the other people in the town who may not want to live near a recycle scrap yard Pelkey did not say. 
Westford residents are a bit perplexed by the monumental “eff you.”

“It’s very odd,” Deanna Wilcox said. “And certainly not the love that I hope everybody is spreading in the world today that we really need."

"It’s somebody’s expression and it didn’t hurt anybody as far as I know except for maybe somebody’s feelings,” another resident said. City staff told the news station, since the sculpture is considered public art, their hands are tied and they’re stuck with the middle finger.  Town regulations and the rule of law restict what town officials can do just as they restrict what business owners and property owners can do.  Perhaps Pelkey should have checked the regulations on the property use before he bought the property.  Does Pelkey even live in the town, or does he just want to put a recycle trash yard there?

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Boston MA - Labor Union Rally to Defend Locked Out Gas Workers - Tea Party Museum - 12 Noon - 19 Dec 2018

Wednesday 12 noon - 19 Dec 2018 - For Locked Out Union Gas Workers - Twitter

Huffington Post renews smear campaign against UK Professor Piers Robinson (LiveJournal) 10 Dec 2018

https://xenagoguevicene.livejournal.com/

A smear campaign against Professor Piers Robinson, chair in politics, society and political journalism at the University of Sheffield, has been renewed with an article in the Huffington Post.

Robinson is one of a small number of academics and independent journalists to challenge the official narrative around the “war on terror,” especially regarding the civil war in Syria. Along with Professor Tim Hayward (environmental political theory, University of Edinburgh) he is a founding member of the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media (WGSPM). Established to facilitate “rigorous academic analysis” of media reportage of the Syrian war, it investigates the role of propaganda more broadly in shaping public perception of conflicts and its connection to western geo-strategic objectives.

Earlier this year, on April 14, Robinson, Hayward and others were viciously attacked by Rupert Murdoch’s Times newspaper as “Apologists for Assad working in British universities,” and as “Assad’s Useful Idiots.” This was in response to the WGSPM shining the spotlight on the role of the western-backed Syrian White Helmets and its leading role in allegations that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was using chemical weapons in the conflict. Just hours before the smear appeared, Britain and France had joined the US in launching air strikes on Syria—citing one such alleged chemical attack in Douma on April 7.

Around the same time, the Huffington Post ran a series of smears targeting Robinson, Hayward and investigative journalist Vanessa Beeley—all penned by senior editor Chris York. In May, York again smeared the three as “pro-Assad activists” in an article on Labour-run Leeds City Council’s banning a Media on Trial event at which they were speaking. York implicitly approved the ban and noted that a Huffington Post report earlier in the week had “drawn attention to the event...”

An article by York, published December 4, is, if anything, even more craven and desperate than his earlier pieces in that it dispenses with any pretence of objectivity. Given the subject area of those under attack, York’s article is a case-study in embedded propaganda.

Under the headline, “This professor teaches journalism at a top UK University. He is also a 9/11 Truther,” York disparages Robinson as a supporter of “long-discredited conspiracy theories about the 9/11 terror attack.”
York does not explain what “long-discredited conspiracy theories” he is referring to. All he writes is that Robinson wrote, regarding the book 9/11 Unmasked by David Ray Griffin and Elizabeth Woodworth, that it represents “a serious challenge for mainstream academics and journalists to start to ask substantial questions about 9/11” in order to “search for the facts and speak truth to power.”
Robinson makes no specific claims on either 9/11 or on the substance of Griffin and Woodworth’s book. When asked by York about his own views on the 9/11 attacks, Robinson replied simply, “My position, as has been the case for some time, is that [conclusions detailed in 9/11 Unmasked ] demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt that significant parts of the official narrative are very likely to be incorrect. It is no longer tenable for academics and journalists to avoid asking probing questions about the possible involvement of state actors in the 9/11 attacks. 9/11 requires further analysis and investigation and this is a position I share with many other academics.”

Robinson is being attacked for his research on Syria and not his opinion of 9/11 Unmasked and the findings of the 23 individuals involved in the 9/11 Consensus Panel on which it is based. It is the raising of probing questions regarding the predatory aims and activities of imperialism underlying the “war on terror” that is verboten for the official propagandists for the state apparatus of Britain and the US―those whom internationally-acclaimed investigative journalist and documentary filmmaker John Pilger rightly described as “Vichy journalists.”

The Murdoch-commissioned smear had sinisterly declared that while a “society founded on Enlightenment principles of liberal rights and free expression treats untrammelled academic inquiry as sacrosanct,” for those with whom the Times disagreed—the “Assad apologists”—such principles did not apply. “The universities who unwittingly provide cover for these agents of disinformation and cheerleaders for despotism have a case to answer,” the Times asserted, effectively demanding the sacking of Robinson and his fellow academics.

The threats and slanders failed, so York has returned to the fray. “The University of Sheffield Department of Journalism Studies is one of the most prestigious in the country,” York states, before asserting that Robinson’s “work has been described as ‘conspiracy-theory driven’, ‘completely insulting’ and of having ‘no interest in truth or justice’ by academics speaking to HuffPost UK.”
York in fact cites just three academics to back up his claims—two in the US. Dr. Yasser Munif, at Emerson College, Boston, is quoted telling the HuffPost UK: “Robinson and people like him are trying to transpose what happened in the Iraq War onto what’s happening with the Arab uprisings of 2011-2 and are thereby denying the agency of the Arab population...”

Munif, originally from Syria, has condemned those on the “left” who oppose US action against Assad as holding a “kind of neutralist position... [which] is a form of tacit support to the Syrian regime because it has invited a number of different state actors, Russia and Iran and others, Iraq, and in a way, Lebanon to play a major role.” Left opponents of regime-change are guilty of not recognising that the Syrian civil war involves a popular nationalist uprising and of “reducing all politics to a state-centric geopolitics.”

Nader Hashemi, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Denver, attacks Robinson and “his friends” as having “no interest in truth or justice... The administrators of the university that he teaches at have to be presented with this evidence. Someone who’s supposed to be objective and teaching propaganda is himself a propagandist.”

Hashemi’s suggestion that a fellow academic should be dismissed for his teaching speaks volumes as to his attitude towards academic research and free speech. Hashemi himself proselytises in favour of the Iranian bourgeois opposition Green Movement, formed in support of Mir Hossein Mousavi. Defeated in Iran’s 2009 presidential elections, Mousavi’s movement was backed by powerful sections of the Iranian establishment and supported by Washington, the US media and the European powers as a potential “colour revolution.”

Hashemi has argued that the US can be a positive force in Iran by elevating “the question of democracy and human rights, and plac[ing] it at the center of any future engagement with Tehran.”
The other academic cited is Lydia Wilson, described as an Oxford and Cambridge research fellow and editor of the Cambridge Literary Review. She is even more forthright in her insistence that Robinson should be sacked. “It is ridiculous that Piers Robinson is teaching propaganda,” she told HuffPost UK. “The most troubling thing for me is how did he get this job? It’s not hard to uncover this man... It’s dangerous to students—he’s working in a journalism department and he can’t analyse journalism sources.” York fails to make clear that Wilson is a research fellow at the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict, University of Oxford, whose members work intimately with figures at the highest echelons of Middle East government policymakers in Britain, the US and Europe.

That York’s piece is a McCarthyite smear is made clear in his complaint that “Robinson’s lectures and public appearances are heavily critical of western governments and media, and he often appears on Kremlin-backed channels such as RT and Sputnik.” Robinson is attacked for suggesting that anti-Russian propaganda is being used to “distract from the west’s ‘aggressive regime change strategy’ in the Middle East.”

While those probing British government policy are to be silenced, the Huffington Post rolls out the red carpet for arch proponents and facilitators of imperialist war. The other authorities cited by York as inveighing against “propaganda” are none other than retired US General Wesley Clark and former head of Britain’s foreign intelligence agency MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove.

Clark was the commander in charge of Operation Allied Force, the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999, in a war aimed at dismembering the country and destabilising the Balkans carried out under the banner of “humanitarian intervention.” Dearlove oversaw Britain’s secret service during the invasion of Afghanistan and the pre-emptive war on Iraq, funnelling what the Chilcot inquiry politely described as “flawed information” to justify war, such as the notorious September dossier and Iraq “dodgy dossier” justifying war based on lies that Baghdad possessed “weapons of mass destruction.”

This included using a description of Iraqi chemical weapons that its “source” drew directly from the plot of the movie, The Rock, a fact known by MI6 and concealed for six months prior to the 2003 war. Yet both Clark and Dearlove are quoted approvingly by York denying that their actions have anything to do with regime change and accusing Robinson of “wildly misinterpreting” them.
Robinson and Hayward have both noted in tweets that the Huffington Post article coincided with the WGSPM work on the Integrity Initiative (II), launched by the Institute of Statecraft in 2015. Documents leaked by internet hackers of Anonymous reveal how the supposedly independent think-tank is a Foreign Office funded black op, responsible for spreading fake news to further the geo-strategic interests of Britain’s financial oligarchy.

Of note in the leaked documents are the descriptions of how the II operates “clusters” of like-minded politicians, military personnel, academics and journalists from Britain and through Europe—to spring into action against anyone deviating from the official line in favour of militarism and war. This is especially critical, not only with regards to the Huffington Post smear, but the Guardian’s latest politically-motivated fabrication against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Its claims that Assange met with former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort were intended to bolster the spurious allegation that the framed-up journalist was a Russian stooge. The story has since been thoroughly discredited. While decrying “fake news”, publications such as the Huffington Post and the Guardian are, in fact, busy manufacturing it.

On Youtube - Prof Piers Robinson on Sky TV  -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHiAZfpXr5Q

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NY Stock Exchange Drops Almost 600 Points - Wall Street Journal Warns of Stock "Stampede" - 8 Dec 2018

https://xenagoguevicene.livejournal.com/

The sell-off on Wall Street continued Friday, with the Dow ending the day down 560 points. The new plunge came amid rising concerns over the impact of the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou on the US-China trade conflict, slower global economic growth, and the intensification of class conflict as evidenced by events in France.

Reporting on the sell-off, the Wall Street Journal said the “retreat” away from US stocks “turned into a stampede Friday, with major indexes suffering declines of more than 4 percent for the week and their worst start to a December since 2008.”

The previous day the newspaper had played its part in trying to boost the markets, following a fall of 784 points in the Dow in the opening hours of trading, by publishing a front-page report that the US Federal Reserve was considering pulling back on interest rate rises next year. This led to an upturn, with the markets closing just 80 points down for the day.

On Friday, both the Dow and the S&P 500 indexes opened with slight gains, but then quickly moved into negative territory, with the Dow down by more than 660 points at one stage. Over the course of the week, the Dow finished down 4.5 percent, the S&P 500 4.6 percent lower and the Nasdaq off by 4.9 percent.

The larger fall in the Nasdaq reflects the sharp decline in tech stocks, which have been hard hit by the deepening US-China trade conflict because of the impact it could have on both the companies’ global supply chains and markets.

Reporting on the market downturn, the Financial Times pointed to the “bearish momentum” and the emergence of the so-called “death cross” in the graph of the S&P 500 index, as its 50-day moving average fell below its 200-day average.

Commenting on market sentiment to the Wall Street Journal, Erik Davidson, chief investment officer for Wells Fargo Private Bank, said: “The list of worries is very, very long these days. Investors are on pins and needles, worried about something at all times, whether it’s the China trade deal, Brexit, the inverted yield curve or monetary policy.”

The main factor in this week’s market downturn has been the issue of US-China economic relations and the prospect that the outcome of the talks between US President Trump and China’s President Xi Jinping, held on the sidelines of the G20 summit last Saturday night, is at best a temporary and very fragile ceasefire.

The Dow rose by 300 points on Monday following Trump’s positive tweets on the outcome of the discussions. But the upturn quickly went into reverse when divergent reports from US and Chinese authorities called that assessment into question, and the Dow plunged 800 points on Tuesday.
This was followed by a further 784 point drop on Thursday morning on the back of the news that Meng Wanzhou had been arrested during a layover at Vancouver international airport and that the US Justice Department was seeking her extradition to face charges related to the breach of US sanctions imposed on Iran.

Details of those charges were revealed in a court hearing yesterday at which it was alleged by Canadian authorities, acting on behalf of their US counterparts, that Meng had fraudulently covered up Huawei’s control of a company called Skycom that was doing business in Iran.

The Canadian prosecutor, John Gibb-Carsley, said Meng had misled financial authorities about the connection between Huawei and Skycom when US sanctions were in operation against Iran. Meng, he asserted, had said there was no connection, when in fact Huawei and Skycom were the same company. “This is the crux… of the alleged fraud,” he said.

Meng served on the board of Skycom, a Hong Kong-based company, for a period in 2008–2009. But Meng’s attorney, David Martin, said there was “no evidence” that Skycom was a subsidiary of Huawei during the time of the alleged sanctions breach. It had been a subsidiary, but had been sold in 2009, and the claim that Meng was engaged in fraud would be “hotly contested.”

The action against Meng and Huawei is the outcome of a long-running investigation by the US Justice Department and Gibb-Carsley said the warrant for Meng’s arrest was issued by a New York court on August 22 this year. It was executed at the Vancouver airport last Saturday at the very time Trump was in discussions with Xi.

There is uncertainty over who knew what while the talks were taking place and whether Trump had been advised. But the president’s national security adviser John Bolton, who was in overall charge of the US arrangements for the discussions, told National Public Radio on Thursday that he knew in advance of the request to Canada to detain Meng.

He said the conduct of Chinese companies, and especially technology companies, which the US claims steal intellectual property and carry out forced technology transfers from US companies doing business in China, was a key issue.

“Huawei is one company we’ve been concerned about,” he said. “There are others as well.”
The move against Huawei is a further indication that for key sections of the US political and national security establishment, the conflict with China is not primarily over trade, but rather the drive to prevent it from expanding its technological and industrial base.

This is why, for past seven months, tentative agreements to move towards a resolution of the trade conflicts have broken down almost as soon as they were made. Last May, a deal that China increase its imports from the US, which US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said had put the trade war “on hold,” was overturned a few days later.

Now, within just a few days of the latest Trump-Xi talks, any prospect of an agreement appears to have been blown out of the water. This is because the action against Meng and Huawei will confirm the view in Beijing that there is no basis for any agreement because the central US aim is to halt China’s development in crucial high-tech areas.

While the US-China conflict was the central reason for this week’s market turbulence, other significant factors have been at work.

The agreement reached yesterday at the meeting of OPEC to reduce oil production brought a rise in the price. Under most conditions this would have led to a rise on Wall Street, but not on this occasion because of concerns that the oversupply of oil in the past two months is the outcome of a slowing global economy.

There is also another, longer-term process at work. The rise in financial markets, and above the surge on Wall Street since the low point in March 2009—the longest bull market in history—has rested on the suppression of the class struggle by the trade union bureaucracy. But this is now breaking apart, as the ongoing “yellow vests’ demonstrations in France, taking place outside the control of and in opposition to the trade unions, coupled with the growing anger among US autoworkers over latest round of plant closures, make clear.

https://www.outline.com/hDazrd

The kidnapping of China's Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou by Canada and the US - 7 Dec 2018

On Wednesday, the world was shocked to learn that Canadian authorities had arrested and confined without bail Meng Wanzhou, the deputy chairperson of the Chinese smart phone giant Huawei, on charges brought by US prosecutors of violating American sanctions against Iran. Washington is calling for her extradition to the US.

The claims by US officials that the move has “nothing to do with a trade war” are transparent lies, dismissed even by the media defenders of the action. Meng’s arrest on December 1 and confinement on tendentious and opaque charges potentially carrying a sentence of 60 years amount to little more than a kidnapping.

The British Financial Times, obviously unnerved by its ally’s action, called the move “provocative,” describing it as “the use of American power to pursue political and economic ends rather than straightforward law enforcement.”

It is, in other words, an act of gangsterism, intended to send a message to “allies” and “enemies” alike: do the United States’ bidding or you will end up like Meng, or worse. In pursuit of its geopolitical aims, the United States functions as a rogue state, violating international law with wanton abandon.

It is the chief protagonist in an international decent into lawlessness that recalls the conditions of great power conflict and criminality that led to World War II. The US imposes unilateral and illegal sanctions on any country it deems an obstacle to its hegemonic agenda, and then employs the methods of terror to punish those who defy its dictates.

But after news of Meng’s arrest stunned the world, the New York Times dropped another bombshell the next morning. As Donald Trump was sitting down to dinner with Chinese President Xi Jinping last Saturday to arrange a “truce” in the US-China trade war, the US president was unaware that the unprecedented arrest was about to take place.

This was despite the fact that figures such as Democratic Senator Mark Warner and Republican Senator Richard Burr, as well as National Security Adviser John R. Bolton, were alerted to the arrest. Asked why he did not tell the president, Bolton, who was with Trump at the meeting with Xi, declared inexplicably, “we certainly don’t inform the president on every” notification from the Justice Department.
Meng’s arrest has upended any prospect of a truce in the trade war between the United States and China. The Financial Times warned that “That entente already looked likely to come unstuck. After Ms. Meng’s arrest, the deadline for progress looks like a time bomb.”

The fact that such a provocative action could take place, according to the semi-official narrative, without the knowledge of the American president, makes one thing abundantly clear: The US conflict with China is not the product of Trump’s personality or his particular brand of “America First” populism. Rather, a substantial section of not only Trump’s administration, but of the permanent or “deep” state of the intelligence bureaucracy, as well as leading lawmakers, have signed on to Trump’s aggressive anti-China policy.

Responding to news of the arrest, Senator Warner, a leading proponent of internet censorship by US technology companies, praised the action, declaring: “It has been clear for some time that Huawei… poses a threat to our national security.” He added, “It’s my hope that the Trump administration will hold Huawei fully accountable for breaking sanctions law.”

Other figures close to the Democrats were quick to praise the move, even going so far as to condemn Trump for not being hard enough on China. “For too long, American leaders have failed to respond adequately to China’s increasing assertiveness,” wrote New York Times columnist David Leonhardt. “A more hawkish policy toward China makes sense.”

None of the three leading American newspapers—the Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal —published a single commentary in the least bit critical of the White House’s criminal action.

This points to the bipartisan acceptance of the principles spelled out by Vice President Mike Pence in a major policy speech on China on October 4, which commentators have called the dawn of a new “cold war” with China. In that speech, Pence demanded that Beijing abandon its “Made in China 2025” plan, which Pence claimed was an effort to control “90 percent of the world’s most advanced industries, including robotics, biotechnology and artificial intelligence.”

Just days after Pence’s speech, the Pentagon published a study on the US defence industrial base, arguing that the United States needed a “whole-of-society” approach to prepare for military conflict with China.

Former Trump political adviser and neo-fascist Steve Bannon praised Meng’s arrest as part of a “whole of government” approach to countering China. “Under Trump,” he told the Financial Times, “you’re seeing for the first time all forces of US state power finally come together to confront China.”

The American political establishment’s more aggressive stance toward China in no sense means a retreat from the conflict with Russia or Iran. In fact, in the two months since Pence announced his new “cold war” with China, Washington has taken some of its most aggressive anti-Russian measures yet, including provoking its ally Ukraine to sail warships into Russian-claimed waters, prompting an exchange of fire, and the announcement that it will withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear forces (INF) treaty.

In their preparation for war against China, a nuclear-armed power, the American ruling class and its military-intelligence apparatus see blocking Beijing’s development as a high-tech rival as critical to not only the economic interests of the corporate oligarchy, but also to the maintenance of US military supremacy.

The world is on the brink of a generational change in wireless technology, known as 5G, which, according to its proponents, will lead to a massive expansion of the so-called “internet of things,” which will be cheaper and vastly more capable than today’s “smart” devices. Among the “things” connected over 5G will be not only home appliances and factory robots, but the weapons of war, which can use the communications network for an edge in precision and speed.

Huawei is the world’s leading provider of 5G infrastructure, and the United States is seeking to use all the instruments of its economic, military, and geopolitical power to squeeze China out of the sector in pursuit of its global economic and military dominance.

The second, no less important, factor is the growth of internal social tensions and political opposition. Under conditions of what the Atlantic Council has called a “crisis of legitimacy” for the state amid growing working class opposition, the ruling class sees in the creation of an external enemy, whether Russia or China, a means to divert explosive class tensions outwards. China, as Times columnist Leonhardt recently put it, can serve to create a “clear antagonist” for the American public.

Finally, the protection of the American technology sector, and the extension of its global monopolies, no doubt plays a major role in deepening its integration into the US intelligence apparatus. The American technology giants, at the behest of figures like Warner, have implemented mass censorship of oppositional viewpoints and dragnet surveillance of the American population over the past two years. In exchange, they have received fat military, police, and intelligence contracts, while their rivals, like Huawei, have been targeted by the American state.

Washington’s actions threaten the most disastrous consequences. In its offensive against China, the United States is stoking conditions that twice in the past century led to world war.

https://xenagoguevicene.livejournal.com/ 

Outline Archive - https://www.outline.com/wLa7a2

US Asked Canada to Arrest Top Chinese Tech Executive for "Sanctions Busting" (LiveJournal) 7 Dec 2018

https://xenagoguevicene.livejournal.com/123364.html

Acting at Washington’s behest, Canadian authorities have arrested a senior executive of Huawei Technologies, the Chinese telecommunications giant, for allegedly violating US economic sanctions against Iran.

The arrest and impending extradition of Meng Wanzhou to the US is a diplomatic and geopolitical provocation. Asian and other global stock markets fell sharply Thursday, due to expectations that the US effort to seize and prosecute Meng will roil US-Chinese relations and torpedo the 90-day “truce” in the US-China tariff war that US President Trump and Chinese President Xi agreed to on the sidelines of last weekend’s G20 summit.

Meng is not just the Chief Financial Officer and one of four deputy chairs of China’s largest private companies and the world’s second largest maker of mobile phone. She is the daughter of Huawei’s founder and current head, Ren Zhengfei.

Meng was reportedly arrested in Vancouver last Saturday, while changing planes. However, her arrest was only made public on Wednesday evening. She is to appear at what Canadian authorities have described as a bail hearing today.

That Ming’s arrest was a calculated provocation is underscored by its timing. US National Security Adviser John Bolton has said that he was aware Meng was in the process of being apprehended when he joined Trump for his Saturday evening dinner meeting with Xi and other top Chinese officials. Yet the Americans breathed not a word about the bombshell they were about to burst, with Canada’s assistance.

As Li Daokui, a prominent scholar at Tsinghua University put it, “Imagine that Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg was detained in Japan or Korea at the request of the Chinese government. Imagine what the political response would be in the U.S.”
US officials and Republican and Democratic Congressional leaders have all hailed Meng’s arrest, which is fully in line with American global strategy—both in targeting China’s high-tech sector and in using US sanctions to threaten and bully states, political leaders, and US corporate rivals around the world.

“Americans are grateful that our Canadian partners have arrested the Chief Financial Officer of a giant Chinese telecom company for breaking U.S. sanctions against Iran,” enthused Republican Senator Ben Sasse, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Chinese authorities, as would be expected, have vehemently protested Meng’s arrest.

“Detaining a person without providing an explanation has undoubtedly violated her human rights,” said Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang. China, said Geng,  “has made clear its stern position to the Canadian side and the US side respectively on this, demanding them to immediately clarify the reason for the detention, immediately release the detainee and earnestly protect the legal and legitimate rights and interests of the person involved.”

Meng’s arrest has huge global geopolitical implications.

First, it underscores Washington’s determination to enforce its punishing, illegal sanctions against Iran. In recent months, top US officials have repeatedly threatened to personally target corporate executives and bankers, including those from SWIFT and other European-based firms, if they refuse to serve as conscripts in Washington’s economic war on Iran.

Second and even more importantly, it represents a significant escalation in the ever deepening economic and military-strategic conflict between the US and China.
China’s largest private company, Huawei is itself a major US target in this conflict for both commercial and military reasons.

Washington has been demanding that its partners in the US National Security Agency-led Five Eyes global spying network—Canada, Britain, Australia, and New Zealand—take action to limit Huawei’s role in their cellphone networks, and to outright exclude it from the development of 5-G mobile communications.

This is being justified on security grounds; that is, on the claim that Chinese authorities could work with Huawei in the same way the NSA does with Microsoft, Apple and other US computer and telecommunications giants to create “backdoors” that facilitate state surveillance.

But there are also huge commercial and military-security motivations for the US offensive against Huawei and China’s other major telecommunications manufacturer, ZTE. The latter has been subject to US financial and other penalties ban for allegedly violating US sanctions on Iran and North Korea.
Washington is determined to prevent Beijing from realizing its goal of becoming a leader in the production of high-tech goods by 2025, because this would eat into the market share and profits of US high-tech companies and threaten America’s military superiority.

The United States, Australia and New Zealand have already banned Huawei from their respective 5G networks.

On Wednesday, British Telecom announced that it would exclude Huawei from its 4G operations, two days after the head of Britain’s secret service MI6, Alex Younger, warned that London had to take a decision about how far it was willing to go in its dealings with the Chinese tech giant.
Japanese media are reporting that Tokyo will announce today a ban on government purchases of Huawei and ZTE equipment.

Canada has come under increasing pressure from Washington to take action against Huawei.
“I continue to strongly urge Canada to reconsider Huawei’s inclusion in any aspect of its 5G development, introduction, and maintenance,” said Republican Senator Marco Rubio, in welcoming Meng’s arrest.

In October, Rubio and Democratic Senator and Vice Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee Mark Warner co-authored a letter to the Canadian government that said that Canada’s access to intelligence sharing through the Five Eyes could be jeopardized if it did not exclude Huawei and all “other Chinese state-directed telecommunications companies” from the development and deployment of the country’s G-5 network.

In a statement that suggested all major Chinese firms should be viewed as national-security threats, Warner and Rubio declared, “There is ample evidence to suggest that no major Chinese company is independent of the Chinese government and Communist Party—and Huawei, which China’s government and military tout as a ‘national champion,’ is no exception.”

Sections of Canada's military-security apparatus, including two former heads of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and a former head of the NSA’s Canadian partner, the Communications Security Establishment, have seconded these calls. Meanwhile the country’s most influential newspaper, the Globe and Mail, has published a series of lurid reports, based largely on innuendo and unsubstantiated claims, complaining about growing Chinese political influence in Canada.

This campaign has been aimed not just at prodding the Liberal government to take action against Huawei, but also to put the brakes on its plans to pursue a free trade agreement with China.
Yesterday Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed that he knew in advance of Meng’s arrest, before making the absurd claim that it was a purely administrative-judicial matter and that he and his government played no part in a decision with huge consequences for Canadian-Chinese and global interstate relations.

Trudeau and his Liberals have been bending over backwards to accommodate the Trump administration, with the aim of securing a revised North American Free Trade Agreement that preserves largely unfettered US market access for Canadian big business and the Canada-US military security partnership the Canadian bourgeoisie depends upon to assert its imperialist interests around the globe.

As part of the revised NAFTA (or the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement as Trump likes to call it), Canada agreed to a US demand for a provision prohibiting if from concluding a free trade agreement with a “non-market economy”–a clear reference to China—without prior approval from Washington.

The Canadian government’s complicity in Meng’s arrest underscores that with the rapid escalation of economic, military and geopolitical tensions between Washington and Beijing, Ottawa is lining up four-square behind US imperialism. Indeed, the Canadian military now touts the South China Sea and Straits of Malacca, likely key battlegrounds in any US-China clash, as of vital strategic importance to Canada

This shift is motivated above all by the understanding, which has guided Canadian imperialist policy for the past three quarters of a century, that it can best pursue its own predatory global interests in alliance with Washington and Wall Street.

Huawei CFO Sabrina Meng Wanzhou, daughter of founder, arrested in Canada at request of US government (South China Morning Post) 5 Dec 2018

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K3tVA2Bguk

 

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