TRUMP DOES NOT CONSPIRE WITH RUSSIA DURING ITS CAMPAIGN.

By Mirta Balea

President Donald Trump was exonerated of any suspicion about a supposed conciliation with Russia so that his hackers could influence in his favor in the 2016 elections.

A report commissioned and released this week by Attorney General William Barr, under the premise of a complaint by former President Barack Obama, before leaving office, concludes that neither the current tenant of the White House, nor his trusted men, conspired with the Russians.

Barr presented his summary of the document prepared by the Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller, who highlights not having found any signs of undue association with Russia of the members of Trump's campaign to provoke the defeat of his opponent Hillary Clinton, nor in hacks to Democratic dependencies in that same period.

Regarding the possible obstruction of justice, derived from the dismissal in May 2017 of the then head of the FBI, James Comey, who opposed the line marked by Trump to marginalize what is known as Russiagate, the conclusions are not so clear. Always, according to Barr, Mueller does not conclude indications of crime, but neither exonerates the president.

Despite the euphoria provoked by these conclusions in the Republican ranks - after two years of suspicion and investigation -, Democratic legislators remain in the breach and demand access without mediators to the report. Barr has argued for the non-dissemination of key points of the document the use of "sensitive material" subject to restrictions for its preparation. The Attorney General may be right, but it is also true that Obama took advantage of the precise moment of his departure from the White House to publicly expose another reverse report, made by the US Intelligence Services, on the interference of Russia in the form of cyberattacks against the ranks of the Democrats and sheltered to reveal it in that it should be known to the Americans. He was even forced for this reason to amend an executive order of 2015.

Some Republican congressmen demanded more evidence so that the suspicions were not based on a mere corporate report of how such attacks could have been carried out. The press noted an attempt to further undermine relations between Russia and the United States and to question Trump's victory, something that Democrats took a long time to digest.

Obama had been announcing these alleged violations for months without presenting evidence until the FBI, the CIA, and the Department of Homeland Security's report was released when he had barely had a shave left in the White House. Spokesman Josh Earnest admitted that the Democratic Administration was not prepared to make public the manner in which the information was obtained and protect the sources, which is the same as saying that it can not be questioned by the president.

Obama pushed in Congress a new battery of sanctions against Moscow and adopted other measures from the presidency as a non-grata citizen to consider 35 diplomats, close the consulates of Washington and California and two buildings dependent on the diplomatic delegation of the Kremlin shortly before leaving the position. The text released by the ex-president, the basis for initiating Mueller's investigation, says that two groups of the Russian Intelligence Services were responsible for cyber attacks. The first group would have attacked the Democratic Party in the summer of 2015 and the second in the spring of the following year.

This document made known to the American public would be the result of a declassification under the argument of transparency. Earnest insisted on his "credibility" because it was made "by agents of Intelligence, who have dedicated their lives to the protection and security of the United States", with a violin fund included. A phrase with the clear objective of touching the patriotic feeling for its assimilation as authentic.

The text was full of verbs like "we believe", "we consider", without giving a single test, perhaps because it was an open source, which removes everything that is classified and evades all sensitive material. The patriots of the report went for the presidential campaign and for Trump and it was clear in the document.

The United States has been subject to numerous hacking attempts, some long in time such as China and North Korea. When Obama released his particular report, he had known the theft by the Chinese of a water drone and their statements that they were willing to return it. The news went unnoticed until Trump spoke about the incident on his Twitter.

The return would take place, as common sense dictates, after, of course, that reverse engineering technicians seized the secrets of the device. Would the situation have been the same in which case to steal it Russia or Iran? I don `t believe. People often forget that those in charge of the Intelligence Services are political positions at the service of the government of the day and at the moment when they were fighting against Russia it did not seem advisable to do it against China. But remember when George Busch agreed to make known about the alleged weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to endorse his vengeful invasion and later turned out to be a lie, which was given, yes, many explanations, without this supposed for the president a fiasco in what he was looking for, to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

The Obama Administration has been the one that has sold the most weapons since World War II and all this despite being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Agreements on arms sales from 2008 to 2015, according to the Congressional Research Service, reach the figure of 265 thousand 471 million dollars. The largest, registered in 2011 with the beginning of the Syrian conflict: 56 thousand 131 million dollars. On Syria and Iraq, according to the same source, 26 thousand bombs fell in 2016, date of departure of the government Democrats.

Accounting in eight years of Obama's management results in a direct interest in switching to regimes that did not like, the Syrian case, for example, with the use of revolutions of a single color and selling weapons to terrorists, in a geo- politician of whom it is spoken rather little.

We all have terrorism always present, we are aware of this new era of violence, but what should take the dream of American society are the cyber attacks of adversaries and I am not referring to the confusing document issued by the former president on Russia. The level of sophistication achieved in the last five years should prepare everyone for the next decade. After September 11, 2001, all the money has been devoted, according to Pentagon sources, to Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence, and to a single objective: terrorism, which has made the country vulnerable in other areas, such as technology, the scientist, the financier, among others.

The world society has been demonetized, many people do not carry cash and our money is captive in a numerical way, not on paper, in a few encapsulation nodes. An attack against all this would have very dangerous consequences, as dangerous as the theft of scientific, technological and other secrets.

If there has been an international significance in Trump's triumph, it is that the process of globalization - as it was mounted - has been somewhat slowed down. The most wobbly are the Chinese, who bet everything on that basket. Its economy is going through serious problems because its paradox is in being a communist dictatorship on a capitalist basis.

While the "trumpists" were rubbing their hands with the statement by Barr, the president of the judicial committee of the House tweeted his intentions to call to declare the attorney general about "the worrying discrepancies" in the final decision of the Department of Justice. It should be seen as a wake-up call to his refusal to take into consideration an eventual obstruction of justice by the president. Barr reported that Russia carried out operations to influence the 2016 elections, through misinformation and the use of social networks, and recalled the infiltration of hackers in the email of candidate Hillary Clinton and her campaign, in which she exposed her ingenuity as an international political figure, which was unnecessarily exposed to cyber attack. It is hard to believe that the actions of this high-level official, who dismissed her need to protect herself, are not punished as would be the case.

Half a dozen Trump collaborators have been charged and convicted of crimes committed during the campaign, including conspiracy or lying to investigators. Some 25 Russian intelligence officers or experts in the management of social networks were also accused by Barr.

Among those sentenced in this two-year trial are former Trump campaign director Paul Manafort and number two Rick Gates, lawyers linked to the president or his environment Michael Cohen and Alex van der Zwaan, foreign policy advisers George Papadopoulos and National Security, Michael Flynn, and computer programmer Richard Pinedo. The condemned confessed several crimes such as tax evasion, fraud, violation of campaign finance laws, lying to the FBI about contacts with Moscow and selling false identities to the Russians.

Other defendants, though not incriminated, are Robert Stone, Trump's campaign and business adviser, who allegedly lied to Congress, Konstantin Kilimnik, former adviser to Manafort, for obstruction of justice, 12 Russian GRU officials for hacking the Democrats and 13 Russian citizens linked to the Internet Research Agency for conspiring against the United States. They were exonerated Donald Trump Jr., the son-in-law of President Jared Kushner and the Attorney General until November 2018, Jeff Sessions.

The attorney general has said that his determination to rule out the obstruction of the president's justice takes into account constitutional considerations around the accusation or criminal imputation of a president in office, which translated suggests that the matter will have to be addressed in another forum or debate. Here we enter the impeachment, which has been flying over Trump's head since he abruptly dismissed Comey. He was in charge of investigating if the Kremlin had infiltrated the elections.

The impeachment is a political trial to a high public office with the risk of being dismissed. The figure is included in the First Article of the Constitution. To start it, a majority of the House of Representatives is required (238 of 435). The trial takes place in the Senate, under the presidency of the Supreme Court.

The Senate has the last word with a two-thirds majority to decide whether or not to acquit the accused. The Constitution provides for the use of this legal figure in case of treason, bribery or other very serious crimes, so its application could not be immediate on the current tenant of the White House.

The conclusion is that although the Republicans consider Mueller's report a victory - known in the terms given by Barr - the doubts persist. The House - Democrat majority - continues its investigations.

What about the BREXIT?

Theresa May

By Mirta Balea


The European Union agreed to delay the departure of the United Kingdom, scheduled for the 29th of this month, until May 22, if the British Parliament accepts the pact agreed with Brussels by Prime Minister Theresa May, which is very unlikely. The president of the Chamber, John Bercow, warned that it would not allow a third vote if there are no "substantial changes" in the text.

The head of government is in a precarious political situation after two defeats in the House in which the opposition and figures of her own party have voted against the measures negotiated for two long years, and after having lost in June of the past year the general elections, that forced she to agree with the Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland to be able to govern.

This, coupled with Bercow's warnings, called on her Friday to send the deputies a letter stating that she would not present the agreement again if continues to have no support. The document release has coincided with the confirmation of the DUP that will still not vote.

If Westminster rejected the agreement for the third time, the next important date would be April 12. By then, the deputies must have decided how they want to make the exit or if they will request instead a longer postponement. The extension must be justified and the country would be oblige to participate in the elections to the European Parliament between the 23rd and 26th of May.

Up to eleven ministers have been sworn in to force the resignation of the chief executive, according to Reuters. Sounds to replace her, his second, David Lidington, and also Michael Gove, of Environment, and Jeremy Hunt, of Foreign Affairs.

The parliament wanted to take control of the process from the government months ago and even a crisis was created in its bosom with the ministers confronting each other and the resignations of two of the hardliners. The prime minister was able to pass the rubicon by committing to resolve the inclusion of new British demands in the agreement. Brussels is reluctant to change what has already been achieved in the long and arduous negotiations.

Negotiating the Brexit has not been, by far, an easy task. The English, if we are guided by the votes, more than the British, in their heat to leave as outside the EU, forgot to forge an alternative plan. This is the reason that voices are rising in the country to proclaim now the need for a second referendum. The People's Vote platform convened a massive demonstration in the center of London on Saturday and a website has collected four million signatures to return to pronounce on the departure of the EU.

Perhaps repeating the referendum is very complicated and even inadvisable, but some believe that gaining time would be smart and desirable in the face of the uncertainty of the moment and the threat of unpredictable and uncontrollable chaos. May's legislature will soon be over and new elections may become a plebiscite for a new Brexit.

If the agreement is passed in Parliament, before March 29, against all odds, May 22 would be the date for an orderly exit from the country, which would have two months to approve all the associated legislation and would not have to participate in the European elections.

The EU seeks to prevent the British remain full members after the MEPs, which would result in greater reliability in the electoral process for the more than 350 million Europeans supposed to participate. If the third rejection takes place, the 27 would have to meet again, possibly on Thursday of next week, to put the final date of rupture.

Among the most thorny issues in the negotiations between the United Kingdom and Brussels is the backstop, the safeguard reached in the 1988 peace agreements to maintain the borders between the Republic of Ireland, member of the EU, and Northern Ireland, territory within of the United Kingdom, and is also one of the reasons for the DUP not accepting the agreement. This would have to contemplate the permanence of the British in the customs union until reaching the frame of a new commercial relation.

Former Attorney General Dominic Grieve, defender of a new referendum, introduced a motion to extend the time provided in Article 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon, in order to reduce the risk of a Brexit without agreement or hard on May 22 - which It is what is glimpsed right now. During the time between the deadline and the final departure on December 31, 2020, the country will maintain access to the single market and the customs union, without participating in decision-making, since it would no longer be a member state.

Article 50 of the EU Treaty was activated for the first time by the United Kingdom on March 29, 2016 and has governed the separation process. The letter leaves a margin of two years to the outgoing country, extendable if there is a mutual agreement. The rules on trade and tariffs of the State would be governed if they were not for those of the World Trade Organization.

European standards do not contemplate a re-entry of outgoing states. The only way out until now was that of Algeria in 1962, when it obtained its independence, and still figured in the treaties until 1992 as if it were still a Department of France. Greenland left in 1985 by referendum, although it still belongs to Denmark, member of the EU.

The United Kingdom has always played in the same league as the EU, but with separate rules. This exceptionality, in a marriage of 40 years, was consolidated with the Brexit and raised doubts about the unifying project as a whole. Faced with the presumable initial threats of a domino effect, the exit process has had a consensus greater than expected among the members, which has not been the case in London, whose parliamentarians are still determined to maintain the privileges, which accumulated for as many decades as no other nation in the area.

The numbers of the vote for the exit reflected that 73% of the young people did it for the stay in the EU, like the main cities, among these, London, in which 60% of that option was registered, and a little more in Scotland, Northern Ireland and North Wales. These votes made up 42% of the No upon departure. It was the rural areas and the over 65s that tipped the scales to reach 58%, a figure adjusted, if possible, but sufficient to make the decision to leave the community of States.

If we reel the vote in political and ideological values, 59% of the conservatives and 90% of the populists - both left and right - voted to leave the EU. Europeanists, divided between Liberal Democrastsl and Laborists, counted 75% and 69%. At that time, everything suggested that there would be no need to invoke the title 50 or wait two years for the exit, but now we see that the British talk about extending the process in an indefinite way.

After the Si could be proven that there was no alternative plan for the exit and this has been built on the march by the prime minister, which is, by the way, the expression that the biggest fan is a convert. Previously advocated a stay in the EU and to be doomed to agree to the departure as head of the Executive, despite not having support, does not tire of repeating that a second referendum is unfeasible and must respect the will of voters.

The EU was established in 1993 through the Treaty of Rome, which included three pre-existing pillars: the European Coal and Steel Community, the European Atomic Energy Community and the European Economic Community, which were joined by foreign policy and judicial and police cooperation. The founders of the integrative project: Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands were weakened economically and politically by the two world wars and in need of consolidating the peace achieved to give trade stability.

It was former Prime Minister David Cameron who gave the green light to the referendum. The ex-Spanish president Felipe González said with crystal clear clarity that the British politician burned down his house and wanted to save the furniture and has been left homeless and without furniture. He will go down in history as the leader who took his country out of the EU, pressing the risk button, despite passing for a Europeanist.

Participatory democracy is fine, as long as it is not confused with a substitute for representative democracy. Cameron left his responsibilities in the solution of the immigration problem, reason for complaint to Brussels, and passed to the population the hot potato in the form of a referendum whether or not they should remain in the EU, thinking first of all that this would pressure their community partners and forgetting that referendums should be exceptional and priced.

It must be said that it was not the first time he made a similar move. The first was with the referendum on independence in Scotland, which won by the hair. He might have thought of a similar result for Brexit, but the shot backfired and the immediate situation was a plunge of sterling to 1985 levels.

The United Kingdom contributed 12 billion pounds a year to European coffers and received much more from Europe. 47% of British exports go to the EU and 58% of their imports come from that region. The investment and commercial ties, if we discount the United States and Canada, move largely towards the region from which the country want to separate.

Germany and France are its most prominent partners in trade, while investments lead Switzerland and Norway. The EU contributes 5% of the British GDP and half of its commercial exchange takes place with two heavyweights: France and Germany, not inclined to accept British whims.

The common denominator among European leaders who have proclaimed the need to leave the EU is that they are not willing to share their wealth for the common good and give preference to their local interests, as if they were tribes, in a world each time more globalized in which the long lights should be on permanently.

The EU is considered an important economic bloc on a world scale and will continue to be so after the departure of its ranks from the second largest economy in the world. In any case, the slap given by the United Kingdom to its partners has made them talk more about redefining, defending and preserving the integrating project to avoid disenchantment over the values ​​built up over decades.

The European Union must remain relevant in a world where other emerging economic forces are emerging in the fight for markets.

TRUMP AND CUBA

By Mirta Balea

When Barack Obama was succeeded by Donald Trump in the presidency of the United States, he acknowledged that differences of interpretation of democracy and human rights persisted with Cuba, but he hoped that the "bilateral interaction" would end up solving it. The ratification of the Cuban Constitution last February, without variations in the essence of exercising power, does not seem to be in line with the detente sought by the former Democratic leader.

What the outgoing president did not tell the public about the consequences of his policy of opening to Havana, was that the new tenant of the White House would clash with the issue of political prisoners on the island and compensation for confiscated US assets, and Cuba, at the other hand, would deliver a long list of claims among which would appear, in a relevant manner, the payment of a minimum of 833 billion dollars as compensation "for the human and economic damage" caused by the embargo that lasts a century.
What would appear before Obama's eyes as a roadmap for Trump backed by the changes introduced the traditional US policy toward Cuba, has stumbled on the road with de Venezuelan power keg and the interest of holding the regime accountable for the oppression and abuses of human rights as it has been happening since the 1960s. The US Administration has blamed Cuba of the crisis in Venezuela, where it says that the Cuban military controls the Bolivarian Armed Forces.
Trump considers Cuba part of a tyrannical troika - which feeds back- ot which Venezuela and Nicaragua are also part. The ratification of the Constitution in a country that a decade before acted as a revulsive in Latin America and the Caribbean on behalf of the creation of a platform of allied nations within the so-called socialism of the 21st century, now has another reading with the departure of two giants: Argentina and Brazil. Obama launched two important migratory decisions just before ending his mandate and little after visiting Havana and having met four times with Raul Castro after the resumption of relations on December 14, 2014. These presidencial directives eliminated Bill Clintons migratory policy called wet feet/dry feet added to the Law on Cuban Adjustment. It cames to say that Cubans intercepted at sea with the intention of reaching America coasts would be returned unless they set foot on land, in which case they would obtain a work permit, initial help, and after a year, they could apply for residency. Panic became evident among those eager to leave the country that suspected Cuban Adjustment Law could ruined either as a whole. The immigration increase was notice in the use of Latin America as a bridge. Cubas allied Nicaragua closed the borders, citing security and sovereignty risks and transferred to Panama and Costa Rica the care of those dissable to continue traveling to the US. The Cuban Ajustment Law was born after de mass exodus of rafters in the mid-1990s. The second decisión had to do with the elimination of the program known as parole for those cuban phisicians on misión in third countries to seek asylum in any US Embassy. This was launched en 2006 by the Republican George W. Bush. The deceased Fidel Castro denounced it as a "brain drawn", of what can be blamed on all the countries of the world. One of those who most condemned Obama's last-minute decisions was Cuban-American congressman Mario Diaz Balart, arguing that were concessions to the Havana regime and a betrayal of the United States' commitment to human rights. The president carried out the program despite the reluctance of the Congress regarding the normalization of relations with Cuba.

Trump's policy since his inauguration has been to reaffirm the embargo and oppose the calls to lift it from the UN or other international forums. With his collaborators, he has resumed periodic reports on Cuba's progress in terms of political and economic freedoms.

Obama's immigration directives were publicized as a way to consolidate the supposed advances in the thaw for which he made them irreversible. Havana, as expected, said it would accept the repatriation of Cubans expelled from the United States as they had been doing and uncovered the double standards of Washington's bosses.

The measures also served to define the interests of Obamas, such as the expansion of bilateral trade and the promotion of economic reforms, evading mentioning the Golden rule, the opening to a democratic system, a fundamental requirement for all previous American governments. The presidential directives came after nominating the first ambassador in Havana after half a century of rupture. Trump warned during his campaign that he would revert all concessions to Cuba "until the freedoms were restored", although everyone knew that he would get involved in a cumbersome, long and complicated process, despite having said before to be good with the process of normalizing relationships. Nobody have to tear his clothes for this. The president has accustomed people to send contradictory messages and if one looks at his own trajectory you can see that this performance has been his way of acting since he was a successful businessman, which attracted politics.

He was part of the Democratic ranks until 1987 when he went to the Republicans for two years. He spent a short time in the Reformation Party and in 2001 he returned to the Democratic Party, which could hold him until he decided to renew with the Republican Party and stand for the 2016 elections. It can be said that he is the first president in the White House without political experience or in elective processes and still won.

The constant changes in an individual are considered in psychology expression of some source of discomfort, although another motivation could be the simple desire to change. People - contrary to what one might think - do not change in a strict sense of the term, so lurching from one Party to another had the objective of finding the most beneficial hole in their life and interests. The personality traits, however, do not vary, and this is why we speak of a president who retains the form of expressing himself of the businessman, acting with certain histrionics, showing a narcissistic side and that in many occasions gives the impression of acting on impulse. As a businessman, he invested years in creating a character as a hallmark and this is what underlies his mandate.

John Bolton, National Security Adviser, a man at the moment of all his confidence, came to say, in 2002, that Cuba was a biological weapons factory and this seems to be in charge of plotting its policy in that direction. He has recently denounced Caracas for his financial assistance to Cuba and Nicaragua, which have been acquiring oil at preferential prices, just as Havana did before with the Soviet Union until Gorbachev turned off the tap. The oil diplomacy went to garate with the collapse of prices in 2014, which has significantly reduced the purchase of Cuba. At present, it receives 50 thousand barrels a day, but until very recently the amount was 115 thousand, with which it covered a large part of its consumption. In return, he sent doctors and experts in key areas such as Security and Intelligence to the Venezuelan regime. When Trump decided to explicitly support Juan Guaidó he placed himself in the line of overthrowing Nicolás Maduro.

It began by cutting off all access to money for the sale of oil on US soil of state-owned PDVSA, which obtains 90% of its profits from that market. Preventing access to Venezuelan funds has meant that the country can not import goods or reverse declining oil production. It has also complicated the payments of the public debt. The numbers speak: the PDVSA produced almost three million barrels per day in 2014 and in January of this year, barely extracted 1.1 million barrels, in a nation with the largest proven oil reserves in the world.

Trump decided to give the shoe at the table a few days ago by reducing the validity time, from five years to three months, of the B2 visa for tourism and visits to relatives. Cuba reacted by saying that this constitutes an additional obstacle for Cubans to visit their relatives and adds to the closure of consular services in Havana and to the interruption of the granting of visas, forcing the islanders to travel to third countries.

Washington suspended the granting of visas when it evacuated 60% of its embassy staff for alleged "sonic attacks" on its diplomats. I say presumably because most journalists wonder what Havana would gain if it had the means to do so with such provocations at a time when Obama's openness falters, not to say that it has been disappearing. Everything indicates that the doctors diagnosed hearing loss and cerebral edema from severe headaches and other cognitive impairments in the victims. The State Department accused the Cuban government of not guaranteeing the security of the delegation. All of Trump's decisions are always directed at his mass of voters, many of whom are opposed to continuing the policy of normalizing relations with Cuba. On September 9, 2017, the embargo was extended for another year in retaliation for Cubans to urge the UN General Assembly to urge the United States to lift it. The extension will be valid until September 14 of this year, according to a memorandum signed by the president, protected by the Trade with the Enemy Act.

The president shortened to 45 days the six months foreseen until now so that the nationals affected by the expropriations in 1960 of Fidel Castro could claim their old properties. The suspension in January of this year concerns the Law for Freedom and Democratic Solidarity, approved by Bill Clinton in 1996 regarding titles III and IV of the norm also popularly known as the Helms-Burton Act.

Since Clinton, all governments have waived this part of the rule. The news agencies have indicated on more than one occasion that they could reach 200,000 lawsuits. The suspension will take effect on the 19th and will end on April 17, according to the State Department. Foreign firms would be exempt, but not those of the "black" list because they are associated with the regime, most of them dependent on the Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior, along with hotels in Havana, Santiago de Cuba and Varadero.

This type of policy aims to channel economic activities outside the military sphere, including travel-related transactions, with the aim of putting pressure on the regime to allow the expansion of the private sector in Cuba. Washington have considered the military control on all the profitable sectors of the Caribbean nation the main obstacle for their prosperity and economic freedom.