The real story that MSM won't dare even ask is how Ellen bagged the 'first' interview with the security guard of Mandalay Bay after he did a disappearing trick on a number of actual journalists.

Did her commercial interests with MGM resorts have anything to do with her getting this interview? Ellen has slot machines at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, and even filmed her appearance there that she aired on her show only weeks before the Las Vegas 'incident' (see clip below). Coincidentally, the first woman she met playing her slots was one of the nurses on the scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbPmIcQVZ24

So where are MSM journalists who feign outcry over every tweet and retweet? They should be wondering why this interview was given to Ellen and her daytime show instead of a hard-hitting news program.

But because of the sensitivity over this whole story, you can be sure no one will question this publicly.

Notice her scripted questions, which btw were leading-the-witness questions -- notice how she's describing what happened as much as her guests are, complete with pointer and diagram. Did the police set her up with the props, and dress the two guys too in those FBI suits? I found the whole setup one of the most fake, orchestrated 'interviews' -- nothing in this verbal exchange sounds natural or believable. It's neither entertaining nor newsworthy. I'm not sure what this is.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7gj1FoRIfE

Ellen's slot machine segment:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMIepNv28C0

US hearings on Capitol Hill, the I-word, Watergate Redux -- the media whipped up expectations ahead of the fired FBI' director's testimony on 8th June to the point that even hardened, media saavy financial traders were interested. His testimony certainly garnered more interest than his 20th March appearance to the House Intelligence Committee. Yet it may be what wasn't said in that testimony that ultimately carried more weight in the future than the over-hyped June one.

In any event, here's my maiden Letter From America, published for London-based LiveSquawk News:
https://www.livesquawk.com/members/letter_from_america_-_comey_testimony_june_2017

It's the 10-year anniversary of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann and this story woke me up to the depths of MSM's faults: its lies, its ability to censor, its ability to block any challenges to reason or analysis, its power to play with the public's emotions, its reliance on spin doctors, PR specialists, "messages" and narratives and really lousy interviews that yield no new "news" but just act as marketing platforms.

I admire and like the work of Peter Hyatt and his dissection of the McCann's latest TV interview is a must-read for anyone remotely interested in this story or the media.

http://statement-analysis.blogspot.com/2017/05/kate-and-gerry-mccann-ten-year-interview.html

Part of the 'Fake News' problem could be solved overnight if you brought back the people forced out of the news business because they were too old, too stuck in their ways and too expensive. 'Fake news' is rarely intentionally fake; it's devoid of perspective or error-ridden. If owners of newspapers, media companies and broadcasters could get past their prejudices and strive more towards quality than profits, then they'd hire older journalists. News would instantly become less 'fake', less subject to manipulation and deception, and less emotional and more thoughtful. If media moguls actively recruited people over the age of 40, brought 55-year-olds back out of early, forced retirement and made 65-year-olds honorary editors, news would become less sensationalized and more accurate, more measured and dare I say, more fun.

'Fake News' has emerged out of trends that have been decades-long in the making. The media, which love to predict and tell you what to think yet totally missed the dotcom boom of the 1990s that destroyed their businesses, has been shedding reporters, cutting back on operations and surviving on bare-boned, skeletal staffs that are largely young and inexperienced. This includes major cable news stations by the way and their bureaus in Washington DC, of all places. I've written about 'boyers' (see Blog 6/2, January 2017): newsrooms are largely populated with these young products of the Information Age who think googling a topic gives them all the answers they need. Experience -- built up over decades of living and interacting with people from all walks and shades of life, of hands-on dealing with different parts of government and business, of making mistakes, of making a fool of yourself and falling prey to deception -- has been so diminished by our corporate masters that it's only natural the young should feel this way as well.

However, older people lived in a day when experience was what mattered. Even as a young journalist in the pre-Internet days, sitting by the Reuters terminal day-in and day-out was frowned upon, fiddling with spreadsheets was dis-encouraged. Going out, meeting sources, building contacts, seeing things first-hand, interviewing people face-to-face were valued. Sure, the experiences could be risky and they were hard to quantify into 'profits' or 'productivity,' but year after year they ended up reaping rewards in the form of context, perspective and an overview - a view that spans large and wide over countless terrains and people. Older people's institutional knowledge has, and continues, to be invaluable to me personally and professionally -- I don't need to consult an encyclopedia or wade through research that would take a week to draw a conclusion from. I can call a voice I trust and ask what such-and-such was like back in 1960.

To not have older journalists in these fast-paced, 24/7 news environments is to further reduce us into Information Junkies always stuck on 'written words', over-relying on 'the written word' and looking for the next unsatisfying hit of words strung together in a cheap news story or headline, instead of curators or builders of knowledge. A case in point was the 'news story' about US State Department officials resigning en masse once Trump took office. A veteran journalist would've informed his staff that political appointees always must resign in a new administration. This is standard operating procedure across all Federal departments and would've happened even if Hillary won. However, the rush to get the scoop first, plus no experience or guidance meant a 'fake news' story that had to later be corrected. But the corrections never do trend, do they, for Information Junkies? The misinformation lingers. In actual fact, some State appointees requested to stay on to help with continuity. But who cares? We've all moved onto the next breathless story.

That's the other thing, older journalists don't tend to get breathless unless they're over-exercising. It takes a lot to shock some of them with current events. They've seen it all, as they say, and can be calm in a storm, whereas younger people tend to slip into panic, outrage and indignation at the first whiff of a crisis. Older, qualified journalists have opinions, but know when to park them at the door. Because they've learned from experience, they can suss out deception and manipulation a little better than Info Junkies who think every 'gaffe' is an intentional lie in which to turn into a cheap piece of headline news.

I may be generalizing a little: I do see some of my senior friends exhibit partisanship rants and rages, while I have younger friends with level-heads and wisdom. However, the dearth of older people in media -- guiding and mentoring our younger journalists on everything from civics to grammar, and writing and speaking on current affairs -- is a big part of the 'fake news' problem. Now more than ever, it's so refreshing and fun to hear an older person talk about past moments not that far back in history that were filled with uncertainty, crisis and drama, and yet somehow "the sun also rises". How would our news stories look with such a perspective?

We've barely entered 2017 and yet more of the "expert" predictions the collective has been brain-washed to believe without question are falling apart at breakneck speed. One of the biggest, most threatening predictions of 2016 was that businesses would leave London due to the Brexit vote. Instead, it's the European Union that wants to ensure that it still has access to London's financial district once the UK leaves the bloc.

My goodness what a twist in The Official Narrative that spun a tale of woe about foreign businesses, banks and corporations supposedly taking flight out of London immediately should Brits vote to leave. Those predictions only grew louder once British citizens did vote to leave, and as negotiations and court rulings continued apace. But out of Brussels, we're getting different word; that EU lawmakers are concerned about higher business costs that could damage the Continent should it be cut adrift from the City of London.  https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/13/eu-negotiator-wants-special-deal-over-access-to-city-post-brexit

The City of London or "Square Mile" isn't your ordinary business district the way Wall Street is in Manhattan or Bay Street in Toronto or 'The Loop' in Chicago. The City of London is a city within a city afforded medieval rights and freedoms that cities can only dream about. It's run by the £1.3 billion endowed City of London Corporation, with its four layers of elected representatives or 'freemen' from feudal guilds (all with their own coats of arms) that make it as plutocratic, as insular, as powerful as the Vatican. 'The Guardian's' George Monbiot breaks it down further: "There are 25 electoral wards in the Square Mile. In four of them, the 9,000 people who live within its boundaries are permitted to vote. In the remaining 21, the votes are controlled by corporations, mostly banks and other financial companies. The bigger the business, the bigger the vote." Knowing this, how could most of the experts conclude that foreign banks wouldn't want to be there? Of course they would, and that's why they've helped make London the biggest financial capital in the world.

The people who write for the 'Financial Times' and 'The Economist' know this, too, because they've written about the City in the past, long before Brexit was an issue. Many of them work here, eat here, drink here, live here. Some of them had great-great-grandfathers peddling their fortunes here. They know the power of the place so they either forgot these facts or were manipulated by the powerful to push another agenda or were actively manipulating public opinion. They were effective, too, in whipping up public sentiment against Brexit based in part on perceptions that have little basis in fact or reality. I see a lot of friends and family wasting enormous amounts of energy worrying about problems that aren't problems, and probably won't be. Unless you want to be whipped around like a ragdoll in the coming years, then developing clear thinking and the capacities to discern, differentiate and discriminate in the Age of Manipulation will be essential.

You don't need to know your purpose to live it. You don't need to understand your purpose to live it. You don't need to know the meaning of your life either. Neither do you need to have your life's journey all figured out. You just need to walk it. In fact, I would wager that 'trying' to understand your purpose, meaning or plan erodes happiness, peace and calm.

Here, though, we have the pope, a learned man, a political man who heads the billions that make up the Catholic Church saying that "we" need to "help young people find purpose in the world." http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_REL_VATICAN_NEW_YEARS_EVE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2016-12-31-13-28-55

This implies that "young people," children and "our" youth are somehow incapable of figuring this out for themselves. It implies that they need the authority (of figures like the popes, priests and politicians) and "us" faithful to live their lives - for the grown-ups in the room to saddle them with labels, analysis and concepts in order to navigate the world. According to the brief AP story (above), he seems to be tying this into the jobs market and speaking as though there is a link between "purpose" in life and survival on the material plane. They aren't the same and no, "we" don't.

The pope notes the paradox of "a culture that idolizes youth" and yet has made no place for the young. Huh? I just had a Russian emigre tell me that her granddaughter has one million 'followers' on her youtube channel on arts & crafts. Her granddaughter is 10! I should be so lucky if 10 people read this blog on any given day :). It sounds like the pope has life reversed, that we're seeing this twist in logic we often see. All this from a man who is heading a church that is dying, with parishes that are closing left, right and center? Maybe the youth could tell us a thing or two. Maybe they are the ones better poised to navigate the world that is coming. Maybe they are indeed living their purpose but in ways that are indecipherable to some  still rooted very much in the past.

Another look at Tony Blair, this time from the perspective of one of the world's leading face readers using ancient Chinese knowledge of energy patterns in the body.

FutureFace's Maura Bright looks at Blair's eyes and ears to gauge the inner workings of Great Britain's former Prime Minister and self-appointed elder statesman. After criticizing the UK electorate's vote on leaving the EU (see "Poster Boy Has No Clothes", June 27, 2016) , Blair has now invited himself to lead Brexit negotiations, not in any behind-the-scenes power plays but quite publicly with The Telegraph now publishing, carte blanche, his sales pitch as the one with the adult chops to extricate Cool Britannia from Brussels.

The timing of Blair's insertion into public life also comes days before the multi-million word (and counting) Chilcot report will be released. It will no doubt touch on Blair's thought process and decisions in leading the UK into invading Iraq, along with the US of course, in 2003 -- despite widespread protests and outcry from the electorate.

"Chilcot! Chilcot! All Fall Down. Except Tony" now on FutureFace. Enjoy: http://www.futureface.com/public-faces

From the man who broke the Bank of England in 1992 and devalued pound sterling , George Soros is warning the UK will "suffer significantly" because of Brexit.

He bases this not on any evidence or facts that the real economy is slowing,  but because of sterling's historic 11% one-day decline against the dollar. Until last Friday, pound's prior record daily selloff was set by Soros himself and his $1 billion arms race against the Bank. I don't recall him worrying about how the UK would suffer back then, do you?

Also, Soros, of all people, should know that countries around the world are competing with each other on currencies -- not on who can boost the value of their currency the most, but who can make them as worthless as possible.

No doubt this is why UK stock markets, in part, have rallied since last Friday's 9% slide. A lower currency is inflationary and will make a country's goods and services more competitively priced in a world drowning in 'stuff.' In fact, the day after the Brexit results, London's FTSE 100 index was one of the top performers in Europe and Asia, closing up 3% on the week. So, no, Soros. Sorry if you were stuck on the wrong side of the sterling trade this time around, but Brexit has not "unleashed" a financial markets crisis. They might be volatile, but have been orderly and functional. Who are the ones spreading fear?

How this man has any credibility left to write columns, carte-blanche, for "The New York Times", boggles. When are we going to acknowledge that our poster boy for globalization, Tony Blair, has no clothes? Even after the lies of weapons of mass destruction have been exposed, the media just can't seem to ween themselves from such authority figures, even as they continue to duck and dodge, twirling around the truth to present slanted agendas, or even when they get paid seven-figures from lobbyists, banks and other interests in clear conflict with the general welfare of people.

How ironic his June 24, 2016 op-ed contribution is titled "Brexit's Stunning Coup", while savaging Labour's Jeremy Corbyn and no doubt catalyzing en masse resignations from his ministers and MPs. New Labour, Old Labour, Post-Modern Labour. If it gets in the way of globalization, get out of the way.

The larger the purported crisis, the greater he can act elder statesman. Tony trots out: "The right attacks immigrants while the left rails at bankers, but the spirit of insurgency, the venting of anger at those in power and the addiction to simple, demagogic answers to complex problems are the same for both extremes. Underlying it all is a shared hostility to globalization."

Our poster boy is of course sensibly somewhere in the middle, neither at the right nor the left, and with no addictions. Please don't hate him for being one of the few with the depth to deal with "complex problems" - even if he contributed to those problems in the first place.

He identifies the hostility to globalization, but it's like it has nothing to do with him. The man's ability to compartmentalize is extraordinary, a case study for DSM edition six. He can't see himself or give an honest assessment of his own behavior. This is a man who has received untold millions from banks, hedge funds and defense companies.  His contributions to refugees, immigrants? The elites' answer to this "complex" problem has been to Put Them Over There. Out of Sight. We Want Them Here But Just Not In Our Neighborhoods. Such arrogance and hypocrisy is galling, and is exactly why the EU referendum was called in the first place. Here's a modest proposal for the "complexity" of immigration: let's set up refugee camps in Hampstead Heath and the Blairs' country pile.

Blair bemoans the fear tactics employed during the Brexit campaign, but then sharpens his own rhetoric on "the economic fallout." He confuses the real economy of goods and services, with the financial markets throughout. If you were one of the hedge funds or currency traders who bought pound sterling at 1.50 against the dollar during the early vote tallies, convinced that the electorate would vote Remain (and many investment analysts and economists thought just that), then maybe sterling's unprecedented 17-figure decline was catastrophic and I won't be surprised to hear about a few fund casualties. However, it's doubtful that the average person will be immediately affected in an apocalyptic way. Markets are doing what they do, pricing in the future. Like the humans they are made up of, they loathe uncertainty and when faced with it, become erratic and act temperamentally.

Also, we are talking about sterling. The UK never adopted the euro currency. It was Blair's own Chancellor Gordon Brown who retained the 1,200-year-old pound sterling as the UK's national currency. Even after the credit crisis and banking meltdown in 2008, when EU apparatchiks were dangling their euro as a beacon of yet more investment flow into the UK, London didn't budge. It was Blair's successor who imposed the "five economic tests" to make sure the UK was worthy of the young currency. What a great delay tactic and how comical in hindsight. Sterling is not just the world's oldest currency, but has consistently been the most sought after currency, and certainly buffered the UK during the Greek debt imbroglio. This is one aspect of the EU we haven't been a part of and so one less bureaucratic nightmare to negotiate. No messy disentanglement here, no pulling euros out of circulation or re-issuing pounds, no disruption to transactions in the real economy of goods and services. But you won't hear any of this from our poster boy, who "believed completely that Britain's future lay in Europe", not to mention his own.

(Note: "The New York Times" overnight removed the quote, cited in my blog above, in its online edition without a correction or editor's note. Times editors deleted Blair's point that hostility about globalization on both the right and left was the reason for "Brexit's Stunning Coup". Instead, he is now quoted as saying the right-far right-immigration issue was the reason. There is now absolutely no mention of the left-banks-hostility-globalization, as referred to in the quote below. It's so telling how the mainstream media, in particular the "paper of record", does wholesale rewrites and revisions after original publication for their online editions.)