Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - The Ukraine Did It? - And Goodbye Robin:

KUALA LUMPUR:   INTELLIGENCE analysts in the United States had already concluded that Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down by an air-to-air missile, and that the Ukrainian government had had something to do with it.

This corroborates an emerging theory postulated by local investigators that the Boeing 777-200 was crippled by an air-to-air missile and finished off with cannon fire from a fighter that had been shadowing it as it plummeted to earth.

In a damning report dated Aug 3, headlined “Flight 17 Shoot-Down Scenario Shifts”, Associated Press reporter Robert Parry said “some US intelligence sources had concluded that the rebels and Russia were likely not at fault and that it appears Ukrainian government forces were to blame”...

I missed that one on the US nightly news.   I wonder if the real truth of this sad incident will ever come out.  Perhaps we will have to file this one with Jimmy Hoffa, Jack the Ripper, and WTC 7.

Speaking of sad incidents, RIP actor/comedian Robin Williams of an apparent suicide at age 63. 

Williams had been battling severe depression.  It has beomce almost a cliché that the exceptional minds of improvisational comedic geniuses that allow them to see the odd associations, absurdities, and ironies of life, can be both a gift and a curse. 

And when the comedy has gone out of life, only the tragedy remains.  For without those who can laugh at themselves and our vanities, what remains of men are the monsters.