CHANGE: China halts oil product exports to North Korea in November as sanctions bite.

Beijing also imported no iron ore, coal or lead from North Korea in November, the second full month of the latest trade sanctions imposed by U.N. China, the main source of North Korea’s fuel, did not export any gasoline, jet fuel, diesel or fuel oil to its isolated neighbor last month, data from the General Administration of Customs showed on Tuesday.

November was the second straight month China exported no diesel or gasoline to North Korea. The last time China’s jet fuel shipments to Pyongyang were at zero was in February 2015.

“This is a natural outcome of the tightening of the various sanctions against North Korea,” said Cai Jian, an expert on North Korea at Fudan University in Shanghai. The tightening “reflects China’s stance,” he said.

OR IS IT? Chinese ships accused of breaking sanctions on North Korea.

Chinese vessels are secretly trading oil products with North Korea in violation of UN sanctions, diplomats have confirmed.

The news is likely to embarrass China and raise questions about its record of enforcing sanctions against Pyongyang over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes.

Diplomats from an Asian country confirmed information published this week in the South Korean press that such trade persists despite sanctions.

Last month the US Treasury published satellite photos of ships linked to each other at sea, apparently trading oil. Chosun, the prominent South Korean newspaper, on Tuesday cited people within South Korea’s government saying 30 such hookups had been spotted by spy satellites since October.

The clandestine oil trade apparently started soon after new sanctions capped the amount of oil products North Korea was allowed to import. 

It’s complicated.

FAKE NEWS:

Slate is running with the same smear as Newsweek.

OH: North Korean defector had anthrax antibodies in system, report says.

The soldier’s name and exact date of defection were not disclosed. But the defector is said to have been exposed to or vaccinated for anthrax, a serious bacterial disease, UPI reported, citing Channel A. They reportedly became immune to the disease before defection.

“Anthrax antibodies have been found in the North Korean soldier who defected this year,” according an unnamed South Korean official speaking to Channel A.

The news comes amid earlier reports that North Korea was beginning tests to mount anthrax onto intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the U.S.

Pyongyang is quite literally a toxic regime.

CHUTZPAH: Former President Obama talks Internet polarization.

THAT’S RICH: Russia is accusing the US of ‘direct interference’ in its elections.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on Tuesday accused the US of a “direct interference in our electoral process and internal affairs” following the State Department’s criticism of Russia’s decision to bar opposition leader Alexey Navalny from running in the upcoming presidential election against Vladimir Putin.

“This State Department statement, which I’m sure will be repeated, is a direct interference in our electoral process and internal affairs,” Zakharova wrote Tuesday on Facebook.

In a statement shared with Business Insider on Tuesday night, a State Department spokesperson expressed concern over the Russian government’s “ongoing crackdown against independent voices, from journalists to civil society activists and opposition politicians.”

“These actions indicate the Russian government has failed to protect space in Russia for the exercise of human rights and fundamental freedoms,” the statement said. “More broadly, we urge the government of Russia to hold genuine elections that are transparent, fair, and free and that guarantee the free expression of the will of the people, consistent with its international human rights obligations.”

Zakharova pushed back. “And these people expressed outrage over alleged Russian ‘interference’ in their electoral process for an entire year?!” she said.

Pointing out that the Kremlin is interfering in its own election is not interference.

YES. Tesla’s make-or-break year? 2018 will test Elon Musk.

After years of bragging about its advanced manufacturing techniques, the Silicon Valley automaker faces a reality check when it comes to making its first mass-market car, the Model 3 electric sedan.

With output failing by a wide margin to meet Musk’s promise of 5,000 vehicles per week by the end of December, Tesla could be facing a make-or-break 2018 The new year may determine whether the company will need to again go hunting for cash and whether it maintains its leadership position in electric vehicles.

Speeding the rollout of the mass-market Model 3 is essential to Tesla’s financial health after the company lost several million dollars per day in the third quarter in its rush to begin manufacturing.

“Is this the year investors will say, ‘Enough’s enough,’ or will they continue to fund Tesla?” Autotrader.com analyst Michelle Krebs said. “That’s the big question. I suspect investors would continue funding them if they see progress on the Model 3.”

Customers, too. Tesla has taken $1,000 deposits from hundreds of thousands of Model 3 buyers, and eventually those customers will expect to take delivery of their cars — or of refund checks.

TYLER O’NEIL: In Attacking Trump Tax Cuts as ‘Theft,’ Democrats Prove They Don’t Believe in Private Property.

Sure they do. But just theirs, not yours.

CHANGE: Arab States Tiring Of Palestinian Overreaction To Trump’s Jerusalem Call.

More than anything, the unofficial rapprochement between Israel and the Arab states is a measure of growing Iranian power due to Obama’s empowerment policy towards Tehran.

PHOTO ESSAY: The haunting faces of prisoners worked to death in Stalin’s slave camps emerge as 100th anniversary of 1917 Bolshevik takeover approaches.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Trump Tweets About Bogus Dossier and Much, Much More.

21ST CENTURY CRIME: Topless protester tries to grab baby Jesus figure at Vatican.

I’VE SEEN THINGS YOU PEOPLE WOULDN’T BELIEVE: Ridley Scott Defends Trump’s Tax Reform.

CHANGE: U.S. Retailers Feel Christmas Cheer After a Tough Year.

Sales, excluding automobiles, rose 4.9% from Nov. 1 through Christmas Eve, compared with a 3.7% gain in the same period last year, according to the Mastercard Inc. MA 0.29% unit, which tracks all forms of payment. E-commerce continued to drive the gains, rising 18.1%.

“It started with a bang in the week leading up to Black Friday,” said Sarah Quinlan, a senior vice president of marketing insights at Mastercard. She added that retailers benefited this year from Christmas Day falling on a Monday, giving shoppers a full weekend to scoop up last-minute purchases. Dec. 23 ranked next to Black Friday in terms of spending, according to Mastercard.

“Overall, this year was a big win for retail,” Ms. Quinlan said.

Nice.

SHARYL ATTKISSON: 10 times the intel community violated the trust of US citizens, lawmakers and allies.

Here are three:

Olympic spying

In 2002, the NSA reportedly engaged in “blanket surveillance” of the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah, collecting and storing “virtually all electronic communications going into or out of the Salt Lake City area, including … emails and text messages” to “experiment with and fine tune a new scale of mass surveillance.” NSA officials had denied such a program existed.

Spying on Congress

In 2005 intel officials intercepted and recorded phone conversations between then-Congresswoman Jane Harman (D-Calif.) and pro-Israel lobbyists who were under investigation for espionage. In 2009, someone — exactly who was never revealed — leaked Harman’s “unmasked” name to the press. In 2011, intel officials captured private communications between then-Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) and a Libyan official. The wiretapped recordings were later leaked to the press — again, by unknown sources.

Journalist “witch hunts”

Internal emails from a “global intelligence company” executive in 2010 stated: “Brennan is behind the witch hunts of investigative journalists learning information from inside the beltway sources. Note — There is specific tasker from the [White House] to go after anyone printing materials negative to the Obama agenda (oh my.) Even the FBI is shocked.” The name “Brennan” appears to reference then-U.S. homeland security adviser John Brennan, who went on to become CIA director.

If we had a Congress that was worth a damn and a press corps that wasn’t wedded to Washington, this wouldn’t be a problem.

RATINGS DISASTER: NFL Cancels Final Sunday Night Game Of 2017.

‘TIS THE SEASON: Rosie O’Donnell Calls Paul Ryan ‘Judas’ After He Celebrates Christmas on Twitter.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: If You Want To Get Into Jazz But Don’t Know How, Start With This Essay Duet.

WINNING: Iraqi Christians return after IS amid safety concerns.

STARSHIP TROOPERS: Army Tests New Super-Soldier Exoskeleton.

DAVID SOLWAY: The Age of the Nothing Burger.

Van Jones, now at CNN, famously referred to the Trump/Russia collusion scandal as a “nothing burger,” in other words, a fantasy designed to serve a political agenda. But that particular scandal is only a kind of subset, a mere franchise of a much more comprehensive enterprise — namely, the ideologically driven perversion of fact. The nothing burger is the Big Mac of the Western appetite for dissembling truth in the interest of institutional deception.

Consider a representative few of the major issues and preoccupations of the contemporary era: global warming, gender fluidity, the Palestinian nation, rape culture, and Islam as the “religion of peace.” None of these entities exist in the way in which we have been instructed to understand them and none can justify the righteous fury they apparently inspire. They are all nothing burgers.

Indeed. But read the whole thing to find out how.

LIZ SHELD’S BOXING DAY MORNING BRIEF: No Pension for McCabe and Much, Much More.

NANCY PELOSI: Tax Bill Going to ‘Destroy’ Its Creators Like Frankenstein. “They’re stealing the silver. They’re taking all the valuables out of the house right away… they’re acting like people who know that their power is short-lived.”

Whose silver is it, anyway, Nancy?

WE’RE DOOMED: Major Companies Announce Hiring, Bonuses, Raises, and Charitable Donations Thanks to Tax Reform.

SKYNET SMILES: Air Force Artificial Intelligence Upgrades F-16, E-3 AWACS.

In a collaborative effort with DOD and the Air Force, C3 IoT is working on a deal to integrate AI-driven software into an F-16 and an E-3 Sentry AWACS surveillance aircraft, industry developers explained.

Developers say the new software should be operational on the aircraft within six months.

The plan is to gather and analyze data, such as operationally relevant maintenance information during or after missions so that crews and service engineers can utilize predictive maintenance.

“F-16s will benefit from predictive maintenance as a way to inform pilots of which aircraft are at the highest risk in terms of being unreliable. We pinpoint systems such as engines and subsystems such as the propulsion,” said Ed Abbo, president and CTO of C3 IoT.

The robot holocaust always starts with good intentions.

WITH IMPUNITY: How Obama manipulated sensitive secret intelligence for political gain.