Russia

While OPEC members were infighting over crude production and export quotas, posturing with temporary production cuts (just so the Saudis could get a six month reprieve during which it clears out a massive internal crude glut), Russia was busy capturing market share, and according to overnight Chinese data, Russia overtook Saudi Arabia as China’s top oil supplier last year for the first time ever boosted by robust demand from independent Chinese "teapot" refineries.

Submitted by Robert Parry via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Whenever The New York Times or some other mainstream news outlet holds itself out as a paragon of professional journalism – by wagging a finger at some pro-Trump “fake news” or some Internet “conspiracy theory” – I cringe at the self-delusion and hypocrisy.

Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Saker,

The Trump era starts now – with geopolitics and geoeconomics set for a series of imminent, unpredictable cliffhangers.

I have argued that Trump’s foreign policy guru Henry Kissinger’s strategy to deal with the formidable Eurasia integration trio – Russia, China and Iran – is a remixed Divide and Rule; seduce Russia away from its strategic partnership with China, while keep harassing the weakest link, Iran.

Drone king Barack Obama took a final jab at Russia before leaving office. During his last press conference on Wednesday, Barack Obama, the winner of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, said that the United States must stand up for the principle that “big countries don’t go around and invade and bully smaller countries.“ Obama was referring to Russia, after the they came to defend Crimea and Ukraine following a US-led color revolution.

While the rest of the developed world woke up in a cold sweat on the first official morning of the Trump presidency, the Kremlin said that Russia's Vladimir Putin was ready to meet President Trump but preparations for the possible meeting may take months, not weeks, according to Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.