United States

US-made munitions worth millions of dollars have been found in former terrorist positions in the city of Aleppo. According to media reports, Syrian government forces discovered a number of depots in recently liberated districts of Aleppo city with a large volume of arms and ammunition that were mostly US-made. Hundreds of boxes loaded with US-manufactured ammunition were found in the eastern quarters of Aleppo as the forces combed various neighborhoods of the recently liberated city for ordnance and military equipment left behind by terrorists.

Goldman Sachs is relatively optimistic about growth in 2017, for three reasons: first, despite the lack of spare capacity, US recession risk remains below the historical average; second, financial conditions should remain a growth tailwind - at least in the first half of 2017; and third, we expect a fiscal easing accumulating to 1% of GDP by 2018. However, uncertainty remains and here is what Jan Hatzius and his team believe are the ten most important questions for 2017.

1. Will growth remain above trend?

Two days after the DHS and FBI released a report revealing what the US agencies alleged was the government-controlled Russian operation behind the "hacking of the US election" which they dubbed "Grizzly Steppe", and which had a peculiar disclaimer according to which nothing contained in the report should be taken at face value or was even credible after the DHS said it "does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained within"...

Submitted by investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  hey’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of  CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.

America’s Secret Planned Conquest Of Russia

The U.S. government’s plan to conquer Russia is based upon a belief in, and the fundamental plan to establish, “Nuclear Primacy” against Russia — an American ability to win a nuclear war against, and so conquer, Russia.

President Putin has accused Barack Obama of attempting to destroy diplomatic relations between Russia and the U.S. by imposing a set of illegal sanctions against Russia.  In response to Obama’s anti-Russian executive order that saw Russian diplomats expelled from the country, Putin responded by saying he would not be sinking as low as outgoing President, preferring instead to wait for Trump to reverse the decision. Konstantin Kosachev, head of the International Committee of the Russian Upper House of Parliament, said Obama’s actions reeked of political desperation.