According to the latest statistics available, Islam is spreading at a fast pace especially in America, Europe, India and Russia. The Crescent North refers to the rise of Islamic forces from Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia, and Central Asia. Islamic conquerors like Tam-erlane, Sultan Bayazid Yild-irim, Khairuddin Barbarossa, Ghauri and Ghaznavi who changed the course of history belonged to this area. The west confused by the rise of militant Islam in the Middle East has initiated a ‘Long War’ by triggering a Shia-Sunni conflict based on the Iraqi model; not realising that recent history has already set in motion the winds of change, with epoch-making consequences, this time coming from the steppes of Asia or the Crescent North.
The Long War was initiated to achieve multiple objectives, with initial foothold in Afghanistan and Iraq. The ultimate aim of the US and west was to create divisions in the Islamic world and get hold of the hydrocarbon hub of Caspian and the Middle East in order to continue exercising dominance over China and the rest of the world. Indiscriminate bombing of Iraq and Afghanistan and the penetration of intelligence and mercenary agencies, like Blackwater, into Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan to create chaos in these countries and spread confusion between various Islamic sects was a clever ploy to support this so-called Long War.
Iraq has already become an example for the entire Arab world. Every day bomb blasts in Shia and Sunni communities lead to violence between them. The agenda is to break-up Iraq into three countries – Kurdistan is one of them. This might ca-use anarchy whose impact would be felt in the wider Arab world. Knowing that sectarian violence can even lead to a war-like situation between Shias and Sunnis, the west wants to adopt this strategy to gain time and survive by vainly trying to improve their demo-graphics in the next 50 years. But they seems to have forgotten that all the major invasions of Europe came from the northeast, most of them from Central Asia and Turkey.
Now, the NATO forces have already started a new agenda in occupied countries in which the US army is playing a vital role. They are all focusing on Pakistan to destabilise and break it up. But thanks to Allah, we are still standing as one nation. The US/NATO forces have lost the war in Afghanistan and are leaving behind small crackers in the region. In the past 10 years, things have totally changed. While America and allies have been dividing and demoralising Islam by the media and military power in the Middle East and North Africa, things in the north have started to get in favour of Islam.
Qolşärif mosque - The largest mosque in Russia, Kazan
The future rise of Islam will come from Russia. Paul Goble (a specialist on ethnic minorities in the Russian Federation) has predicted that within the next few decades, Russia will become a Muslim majority state. This situation has alarmed the Russians as well as western leaders; today Russia has about 8,000 mosques while 15 years back there were only 300. According to statistics, by the end of 2015, the number of mosques in Russia will cross the figure of 25,000. Most alarming of all for the Russians and the west is: “By 2015, Muslims will make up a majority of Russia’s conscript army.” Russia’s white population is declining, but the Muslim population is growing at a fast pace. And in 2030 to 2040 its population will, most likely, have a big majority of Muslims.
The Turks also are abandoning the western culture, as their government focuses more on good relations with Muslim countries. The Israel-Gaza conflict has further strained relations between Turkey and the west. The degree of change in the Turkish public opinion during the Gaza conflict, and the scale of criticism of Israel that was manifest in popular demonstrations, may suggest that Turkish-Israeli and Turkish-western relations have been seriously damaged. The Turkish people support Islamic trends and culture. In the past years they have developed their economy at a tremendous rate. Politically, they have become more conscious of their Muslim identity; Turkey was the only Muslim country whose prime minister visited Azad Kashmir in Pakistan.
Afghanistan, another Muslim country, is already at war with the allied forces and the Afghan Taliban have pinned down the US/NATO forces. Today there are more US and NATO casualties in Afghanistan than ever before. Surprisingly these simple people have defeated two big superpowers of the world within a span of three decades. In this backdrop and the well conceived saying, “Afghanistan is the graveyard of superpowers”, America today has started to initiate peace talks with the Taliban.
The flag of Pakistan is meant to represent the country's Islamic heritage with its use of the crescent and star against a dark green background.
Last but not the least comes Pakistan, a country at war, a country facing economic crisis, a country with power shortages, a country full of corruption, and a country having problems in managing its resources. But it is a nuclear power, produces 10 percent of the world’s food, has the most efficient Islamic army, has millions of patriots and has the identity of being the fortress of Islam. Despite the nexus of Indo-US-Israel and 20 to 30 members of NATO to support terrorism in Pakistan; it is still standing.
Today Pakistan is at centre stage of the Crescent North. The rise of Pakistan will be seen when the US and its allies exit Afghanistan. The Taliban will again form government and lay the foundation of real AfPak. Yes, there will be an AfPak; but quite different from the western agenda. The two countries could move towards forming a confederation-like alliance. Hopefully, it will be a regional power of the next decade and may merge into the North Crescent to assume a bigger role.
(See also: The Inevitable Pakistan-Afghania Union: “A” in Pakistan is for “Afghania”)
The best course for Muslims of the world is to come to the right path of Islam. The west must stop roaming around in the south; if it really wants a challenge, it should visit the north where the crescent revolution is taking shape. by Umar Waqar
BEIJING: China has signaled it wants to go the US way and set up military bases in overseas locations that would possibly include Pakistan. The obvious purpose would be to exert pressure on India as well as counter US influence in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
“(So) it is baseless to say that we will not set up any military bases in future because we have never sent troops abroad,” an article published on Thursday at a Chinese government website said. “It is our right,” the article said and went on to suggest that it would be done in the neighborhood, possibly Pakistan.
“As for the military aspect, we should be able to conduct the retaliatory attack within the country or at the neighboring area of our potential enemies. We should also be able to put pressure on the potential enemies’ overseas interests,” it said.
A military base in Pakistan will also help China keep a check on Muslim Uighur separatists fighting for an independent nation in its western region of Xingjian, which borders the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan. Beijing recently signed an agreement with the local government of NWFP in order to keep a close watch on the movement of Uighur ultras.
“I have personally felt for sometime that China might one day build a military base in India’s neighborhood. China built the Gadwar port in Pakistan and is now broadening the Karokoram highway. These facilities can always be put to military use when the need arises,” Ramesh V Phadke, former Air Commodore and advisor to the Institute of Defense Studies told TNN.
Phadke said the article in very significant. “The purpose may be to see how the international community reacts to it,” he said.
China, which has no military bases outside its territory, has often criticized the United States for operating such overseas bases. It has not just changed its standpoint but also wants to enter the lucrative protection business.
“With further development, China will be in great demand of the military protection,” the article said. Pakistan, which buys 70% of its military hardware from China, is likely to be an eager buyer for such protection. [...]A Pakistani expert on China-Pakistan relationship has a different view on the. [...]
A Chinese military base can tackle several international relations issues, it said. One of them is “the relationship between the base troops and the countries neighboring to the host country.” This is another indication that Beijing is considering Pakistan as a possible base. China’s argument is that a foreign base would actually help regional stability.
“If the base troops can maintain the regional stability, it will be probably welcomed by all the countries in the region,” the article said. Beijing is conscious that the move might result in opposition from the US, UK and France which has overseas military bases.
“Thirdly, the relationship between the big countries in the world. The establishment of the troop bases is sensitive to those big countries which have already set up the bases abroad,” the article said. China mulls setting up military base in Pakistan, Saibal Dasgupta, TNN, 28 January 2010, 07:58pm|
Hainan Naval incident: Beijing to USA-Back off–Can’t you read the sign “Sea of China is Chinese territory”?
Revising Finance 101 for the Chinese Century: Political impact of Center of Gravity shift from New York to Beijing
China sets conditions for bailing out US and buying US T-BillsUS goes begging to Beijing: India feels the pain
Jittery Delhi fears Chinese attack by 2012 Why the US gave up India as a strategic partner
For More details and other articles on China, please visit Articles on China on Rupee News
For More details and other articles on Bharat, please visit Articles on Bharat on Rupee News
Bill Gates, the world’s richest man now re-cast as a global philanthropist, has pronounced his verdict on the Chinese internet row, telling the ABC television network’s Good Morning America that web censorship in China is ‘very limited’.
“The Chinese efforts to censor the internet have been very limited,” he said, “It’s easy to go around it, and so I think keeping the Internet thriving there is very important.”
There are many things to be said about the extent and nature of web censorship in China, but “very limited” is not one them.
As Preston Gall at Computer World put’s it.
“He’s wrong. The Great Firewall of China is not ‘very limited;’ if it were limited the Chinese government would not bother to spend the amount of time and money it does enforcing Internet censorship.”
While it is true that “scaling the wall” using a Virtual Proxy Network (VPN) is relatively simple, the truth is that most people in China don’t know how to do it.
It is also true that most people in China can’t be bothered to do it – which is part of the subtle effectiveness of the system. The Great Firewall is far enough back from ordinary life that most of China’s chatters and gamers are not inconvenienced by it, but that doesn’t mean censorship is limited.
On the contrary, it is omnipresent, hanging over the Chinese internet (and society) like a brooding cloud, shaping the actions and habits of its users even when it is not overt.
I was thinking that this was really too cynical, but then I read Gates comments to the New York Times “bits” blog in which Gates said he was unimpressed and perplexed by Google’s so-called ‘stand’ over censorship.
“They’ve done nothing and gotten a lot of credit for it,” was Gate’s observation. That sounds dangerously like sour grapes to me.
Even if he doesn’t mean to, Gates is presenting himself as a China stooge and a shameless opportunist. My betting is that this will backfire horribly – for him and Microsoft – on both sides of the Great Firewall.
BEIJING — It was the height of the Cultural Revolution, but in the heart of China’s capital, in range of the prying eyes of foreign embassies, young Beijingers had embraced the tenets of capitalism.
Corrupted by dreams of profit, crowds of 500 or more were gathering every Sunday on a street in the city’s embassy district to ply a shameful trade. “They are learning how to do business and raise money,” one city official wrote darkly. “This is seriously harmful to the healthy growth of the successors of the proletariat revolution.”
Such was the state of affairs in 1966, when selling pigeons at an impromptu street market was seen as an obstacle to the triumph of socialism — and, the official added, as a waste of bird feed, too.
The records on the Beijing pigeon market, like thousands of other Cultural Revolution documents, lay silent for decades, deemed state secrets by a government hardly eager to highlight Mao’s excesses. But last year, China quietly opened the archives of selected declassified government files from that era, in Beijing, Shanghai and Xi’an.
And so a veil has begun to lift on this and other prosaic stories of the Cultural Revolution — some sad, some funny, most humdrum to an extreme.
The files of the Cultural Revolution, which raged from 1966 until Mao’s death in 1976, make up a mere 16 of the 21,568 volumes that the Beijing Municipal Archives has made public in four separate releases — in 1996, 1997, 2001 and 2009. (The other files cover periods of Chinese history from 1906.) Stored in thick binders on library-style stacks, they can be viewed in the Municipal Archives building, a spacious, modern structure with overstuffed chairs and a scholarly atmosphere on the south side of the city.
The yellowing files give scant insight into those days’ atrocities: the denunciations of parents by children; the humiliation of intellectuals; the millions of lives ruined by Red Guards ordered to remake society through upheaval. Mao’s personality cult made him a living god, and armed violence broke out over his affections. Everything was politicized. Many committed suicide.
Today, that era has been all but obliterated from the official history of the People’s Republic, its horrors glossed over in history books. While many younger Chinese know that the country passed through a period of turmoil, scholars say, few have any idea of its wild extremes. Events that were “earth shattering have now turned into words with vague and sketchy meanings,” Chen Xiaojing, a Communist Party official from the time, wrote in a carefully hedged account of his experiences, “My Cultural Revolution Years.”
Why the government is releasing some documents from the era is unclear. Archive officials declined repeated requests for interviews. Experts say the files contain little if any material that government censors would regard as incendiary.
“For people like me who have been studying the Cultural Revolution as a profession, it’s better than having nothing at all,” said Xu Youyu, a historian and former researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. “But the things I want to know are, for example, how many homes the Red Guards had gone to raid and what they took out of each home. There’s not a chance of finding those things in these documents.
“If you air these things out, people may start asking why it happened. And this is not a question that is directed only at 1966, but may be turned around and asked about the current situation in China.”
Yet a picture of Chinese life 40 and 50 years ago does emerge from the archives. The files, some nearly transparent and thin as one-ply tissue paper, include handwritten drafts of speeches, lists of production quotas, song lyrics, government regulations and minutes of groups that studied Mao’s words. The texts embrace the political rhetoric of the day, in which all problems were succinctly rendered into rhyming epithets.
The files apparently have been filtered for anything dealing with deaths and imprisonment, and they describe a country still fervently Communist, and unrecognizable today. They narrate the story of a country in the throes of madness, when “Mao Zedong thought” cured everything from truancy to traffic jams to agricultural chemistry to illegal pigeon sales.
Consider: records from 1972, taken at a grade school outside Beijing, show that math students were made to sing two revolutionary songs and study and discuss six Mao quotations for 25 minutes of each class. The remaining few minutes were spent doing math.
In 1967, a report urged forming special groups at the provincial and city levels to “use every conceivable means to guarantee production” each year of 13,000 tons of specially formulated red plastic — required for the covers of Mao’s “Little Red Book” of quotations.
“The Conference on the Situation of the Special Plastic Used by the Works of Chairman Mao” proclaimed that producing the plastic was “our glorious political responsibility.” To hold everyone accountable, the conference produced a chart with a month-by-month breakdown of production levels.
At times, the files veer perilously close to black, or perhaps red, comedy. In 1970, the annual Representative Conference of the Enthusiasts of Chairman Mao’s Works from the City Transportation Bureau studied rush-hour bottlenecks created because workers were required to arrive early to study Chairman Mao’s works. The bottlenecks, the workers concluded, were the work of “conservative rightists and selfish departmentalism and other mistaken ideas.”
Yet there are also oblique hints of more sinister processes at work.
Many reports began with anecdotes of selfless revolutionary fervor. In one of them, Liu Chunnong, a transportation security guard, recounted in 1968 how his dozen pet goldfish had been his pride and joy. After a party meeting, he said, he took the fish outside and buried them alive. Raising goldfish, he wrote, had been criticized as a petit bourgeois practice.
In a handwritten series of 1972 speeches, many of them heavily edited in pen, a teacher from Beijing’s outskirts recalled how his comrades “patiently and delicately” sought to reform a teacher who was not a worker, but a member of the wealthy class. Rounds of criticism had little effect, so the group chose to help him realize his mistakes through physical labor, by weeding farmland.
“He pulled grass,” the speech read. “At first, he was squatting, but he couldn’t handle it after two days. Then he pulled the grass while kneeling. Finally, he did it while crawling.”
Party censors excised the tale of the exhausted teacher from the final draft of the speech
Watched Kundun last night, which is the story of the 14th Dalai Lama from just before he was found until his exile from Tibet. Though I was already quite familiar with this version of events, it was quite an experience seeing it dramatized on film. Not counting any items I already own, I’ve decided that I won’t be purchasing anymore products that are made in China. I’m ashamed that I haven’t done this sooner. I just believe that dollars are akin to a vote. They say, “I support you” or “I need you” to a degree. As such, I neither support, nor wish to rely upon any government that forcefully commandeered a peaceful country, forced children to pull gun triggers on their own parents, forced priests and nuns to fornicate in the streets and who have gone to such great lengths to suppress an entire culture.
Nope. Can’t do it.
Hopefully, my silent protest will add weight to the millions of others whose hearts became convicted long before my own.
Vietnam’s tourism to be promoted on China TV QĐND – Thursday, January 21, 2010, 21:3 (GMT+7)
The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism has been engaged in making a 15-minute film, including 30 seconds of footage of advertising, to introduce Vietnam’s popular landscapes, trade villages and culture.
The film will be broadcast daily on Vietnam Television and 3 times a day on several Chinese television channels for a month.
The film will be shown in the second quarter of 2010 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Vietnam’s tourism sector.
Today was a busy day for traders and followers alike. First Goldman Sachs(GS) set the day off blowing numbers away as they usually do but facing scrutiny for it. This was a good thing to see for the financial sector but these thoughts were quickly erased by President Obama’s address on banks and the rise in jobless claims. Oil inventories were up which put pressure on oil service sector and commodities. The Chinese came out with numbers to back their theory stated yesterday about needing to slow the economy. The tech sector was impressive with Google(GOOG) posting great earnings(listed in the previous post) and Advanced Micro Devices(AMD) posting their first 4th quarter profit in 3 years.
If there is one stock I would be watching tomorrow to show the true state of the economy, make is McDonalds(MCD).
O fluxo de investimentoestrangeiro direto no Brasil sofreu uma contração de 49,5% em 2009, quando comparado a 2008. A taxa foi superior à média mundial, que obteve queda de 39%, e faz com que o Brasil perca posições no ranking dos maiores destinos deste tipo de investimentos.
Os dados foram divulgados pela Unctad (Conferência das Nações Unidas para o Comércio e Desenvolvimento), que prevê que uma sólida recuperação nos investimentos só será sentida em 2011.
“[A fragilidade se dá] especialmente porque a recuperação teve o impulso potencialmente transitório de pacotes econômicos especiais implementados pelos grandes governos”, afirma o relatório.
A notícia é um dos principais destaques nos jornais e cadernos de economia desta quarta-feira (20). Veja também as demais manchetes referentes a economia e finanças que são ou poderão ser assunto no mercado:
O Estado de S. Paulo
B1 – Rombo da Previdência Social cresce 12,6% e fecha ano em R$ 42,9 bilhões;
B1 – Uso do fundo soberano influencia as contas;
B3 – Trabalho: em dezembro, 300 mil vagas foras fechadas no país;
B4 – Eletrobrás terá reforço de R$ 14 bilhões;
B7 – Queda de investimentos estrangeiros no Brasil supera a média mundial;
B7 – China eleva juro pela 2ª vez em 8 dias;
B10 – BNDES negocia compra de participação na Hypermarcas.
Folha de S. Paulo Dinheiro – Investimento externo cai mais no Brasil;
Dinheiro – Após dois anos em queda, déficit do INSS cresce 12,6%;
Dinheiro – Indústria paulista só deve zerar perda de vagas em 2011;
Dinheiro – Energia: Petrobras produz mais petróleo em 2009, mas não atinge meta;
Dinheiro – Cimento: Votorantim admite interesse na Cimpor;
Dinheiro – Mineração: venda voltará a nível pré-crise, diz Vale;
Dinheiro – Energia 1: Oderbrecht e Camargo Corrêa se juntam para Belo Monte.
O Globo Economia – China pressiona bancos para conterem empréstimos.
Jornal do Brasil Economia – Haiti: nações desenvolvidas perdoam dívida externa.
Valor Econômico A2 – Preços de produtos industriais no atacado voltam a subir, indica IGP-M;
A4 – Déficit da Previdência sobe e atinge 1,41% do PIB em 2009;
A9 – Forte queda no investimento externo;
A12 – Bric cresce, mas ainda falta peso para liderar;
B3 – Vendas de Multiplan e BR Malls crescem 11%;
B5 – Vale já vê mercado melhor que antes da crise;
B6 – Andrade Gutierrez fecha acordo com BNDES e leva Cemig;
D2 – Multiplus dá inínio à oferta de ação que pode girar R$ 1,2 bilhão;
D4 – Vivo ganha atenção com resultado e dilema de sócios
According to the LA times, after making 75 million dollars and becoming the most successful movie of all time, James Cameron’s overrated epic Avatar is being pulled from all of its 2-D screens in China. Sighted by some to be a defensive political move in response to a feared backlash against recent Chinese government upheavals, the decision to pull the film could very well be much less extravagent. China has a mere 4000 screens and they allot preference to domestic Chinese releases. The L.A. Times cites David Wolf in that “most foreign films get a 10-day run before being pulled. Executives at Fox had expected “Avatar” to play much longer, however, due to its massive popularity.” China has done this multiple times in the past, and has recently sighted the upcoming Chinese New Year as the motivation to pull Cameron’s Blue-Cats-R-Us. Regardless of the intent, this is one of the handfuls of times that I side with the Chinese Government and find myself strangely appreciative of their non-reverential status towards the film. Maybe we should put sanctions on how long movies can run here. Hahaha, I kid, I kid.
Kris Aquino admitted in The Buzz that they are temporarily separated because of a girl name Mayen Austria (who happens to live in the same subdivision – Valle Verde). She has temporarily moved in to the house of one of her sisters with her children.
She clarified that her confrontation with the Mayen’s mother was civilized and that she never raised her voice. That’s contrary to the report that came out in Inquirer. At one point during the interview she even apologize to Mayen’s mother because she said she acknowledges that Mrs. Austria was also an unwilling victim and was only involved because she happens to be the mom.
However, when she talked about Noynoy she obviously got emotional although she was really trying to control it. But she clarified that she is only going against the ethics rule of ABS-CBN that prohibits her from talking about Noynoy because she is involve. She clarified that Noynoy never condone any of her acts which Noynoy deems ‘immoral’, and she in so many words said that Noynoy is conservative in some aspects of life. She is obviously angry when she clarified that Noynoy should not have been dragged to the issue because it was a domestic issue and not a national concern. She also wondered as to why is that people came to know about the incident even if they were in an exclusive subdivision and was only talking to the mom and Mayen, when the latter joined them.
Kris clarified that the separation with James is temporary but that it could lead to a more permanent separation depending on how James reacts to the situation.
For a Feng Shui believer like me I think she should consider consulting her Feng Shui consultant for this. It was rumored that she has ‘temporarily’ moved to another consultant. My friend Joy Lim again just smiled when I asked her this and refuse to deny nor confirm the industry rumor.
Talking about Joy Lim of Charms and Crystals. I’m very happy to announce that another very good Feng Shui Expert that I consult, Jeff Co, has just recently started his own blog here in wordpress.
Jeff Co, for me is one of the best Feng Shui expert, if not the best. He is not famous with the general public only because he is a very private person and likes to keep his personal life private. He doesn’t really enjoy fame.
However, when it comes to his Feng Shui skills, I think he really is one of the best. he has consulted for several politicians and celebrities. He doesn’t want to share who they are but I once saw him picked up by a politican who happens win all the office he has run for. He also consults for a lot businessmen, one of which is an owner of a mall chain. But more than that a lot of people consult him for their personal life and for their relationship problems like love life.
Unlike other Feng Shui experts, his approach is very personal and he needs to count your Bazi which involves a person birthdate and time. He doesn’t prescribe generic Feng Shui charms but instead make one or suggest one that is really appropriate for you. Don’t get me wrong Joy Lim does this also but Jeff Co is stricter about this, and I believe both Joy Lim’s and Jeff Co’s charms both works really well.
Jeff who trained in China and Tibet has started his blog upon the persistent, not so gentle(Joke!), request of his friends and clients. He is also now making himself more available to the general public.
For those who wish to consult Jeff, you can leave a comment with your number here and I’ll forward it to him. You can also check his blog site which is http://fengshuimiracles.wordpress.com . Again he just started so he only has written a few things, but I must say very substantial.
So I think Kris if you really have to change Feng Shui go to Jeffrey Co!
Tiksey Gompa (Monastery), Ladakh, Inida. Canon New F1 camea and Canon 50mm f1.8 lens with Agfachrome 100 film
Today’s post is the second of two articles on my first overseas trip. It’s a reasonably long article accompanied by 4 photos so, even if you don’t feel like reading it all, please make sure you click on the More symbol and scroll down to see the rest of the photos.
It was early August 1988 and I had crossed the border from Tibet into Nepal. After a difficult trip to Kathmandu, where the upper end of the highway to the capital had been washed away in a flood, I hiked for an afternoon and much of the next day until the state of the road improved and I was able to catch a bus the rest of the way to Kathmandu.
Nepal wasn’t a major part of my travel plans. I had originally planned to travel overland from Hong Kong through China into Nepal, around the top of India and then through Pakistan into Kashgar in far northwest China. Striking out from Kashgar I would journey across the country, via the fabled Silk Road, to Beijing. From there I would travel back to Hong Kong from where my return flight home was booked. The ticket included a special return trip to the Olympic Games in Soul. I wasn’t that excited by the event, but the opportunity to travel to another country was certainly enticing.
Anyway the dodgy meal I’d mentioned in my last post, on my journey from the Chinese border to Kathmandu, continued to cause me problems. I suffered from terrible stomach problems (I’II spare you the details) and, as a consequence, saw very little of the country. After around 10 days I took a flight to Varanasi, the famous city on the holy Ganges River. It is here where Hindu’s hope to be cremated and have their ashes cast onto the river. I remember reading at the time that, as the very poor couldn’t afford the cost of the ceremonial cremation, deceased babies from poorer families were often singed, rather than cremated, and their bodies thrown into the river. In an attempt to deal with the problems this practice was causing a species of crocodile had been introduced into the river to finish off the bodies. This policy wasn’t popular with local fisherman whose boats were little more than large canoes. They were, naturally, sacred of the crocodiles.
After a few interesting days, including a sunset boat trip on the Ganges, where my latest travelling companion was hasselled by our boatman causing me, once again, to swing the tripod, I took a night train to New Delhi.
Well, that train trip was certainly an adventure. I was robbed in my sleep. The next morning I was without my passport, plane ticket home, travelers cheques and all my cash, albeit for about 80 cents. There was no doubt that the eight or so seudo professionals, who bordered the train in the middle of the night, were suspicious characters. A guard approached with a 303 rifle pointed straight at them but, with a “now look here my good man” approach they embarrassed him and caused him to back away and leave the carriage. Outside of an old B-grade movie I doubt that I’d ever seen someone outside of a hospital or medical clinic wandering around with a stepascope around their neck.
Canon New F1 camera and Canon 50mm f1.8 lens with Agfachrome 100 film
Once I reached New Delhi I headed straight for the Australian Embassy where I was made to stand, in pouring rain outside the front gate, while the two local security guards grinned at me from the shelter of their guardhouse. Once inside the treatment was little better. I was interegated by an Australian Diplomat to determine whether or not I was an Australian Citizen. Eventually I passed and was issued with a temporary (12 month) passport and a hardship loan of around $70 cash. American Express were wonderful and my travelers cheques were quickly replaced. Mum and Dad forwarded cash and, after a few days of beaurocratic hassles, I was ready to get back on the road. Unfortunately two events threatened to stop me continuing my travels. Pakistan’s President Zia was killed, probably assassinated, when his plane exploded. The turmoil that followed meant that it was too risky for me to continue my journey through Pakistan and then back into China. The second obstacle I faced was a miserable Indian beaurocrat who refused to re-issue me with a new Indian visa for my temporary passport. As a consequence, although I was certainly in the country, I was not allowed to leave. His argument was that the flight from Kathmandu to Varanasi, by which I’d entered the country, was a domestic flight. The fact that both cities were in different countries, Nepal and India, appeared irrelevant to him. The discussion continued round and round until I left totally frustrated. After a few days travelling back and forth to Agra, where I visited the magnificent Taj Mahal and was driven to near insanity by touts, I decided to head north to Kashmir and then, by bus over the Himalayas, to Ladakh were I met new friends and had many great experiences.
Canon New F1 Camera and Canon 24mm f2.8 lens with Agfachrome 100 film
On the way back from Ladakh I stopped off in Srinagar where I met a Swedish army doctor serving with the United Nations (UN) who were there to monitor the ceasefire line between India and Pakistan. He diagnosed my stomach condition as giardia and prescribed me with the appropriate medication. Within a day or two I was cured and, after 6 weeks of continued illness and a loss of around 27 kilos, I began to recover my strength.
Canon New F1 camera and Canon 50mm f1.8 lens with Agfachrome 100 film
The image at the very top of this article was made at Tiksey Gompa (monastery) in Ladakh, India. It’s a lovely gompa which, at 3,600m altitude, provides a commanding view from the rooftop just outside the main temple. The Champa Buddha Statue in the above photograph is 15 meters high and housed inside the main temple. The statue possess both serene and majestic qualities, which is probably why it’s been featured in numerous films. I may well post one or more images of this location over the next few weeks.
This final image was made of an elderly pilgrim at Hemis Gompa, 47 km west of the capital, Leh. He was an ideal subject but, sadly, the conditions were such that making a great photograph of him was impossible. These days there would be all manner of things I could do to reduce the extreme contrast under which I was shooting. But, as it is, the fact that I’ve completely lost his eyes in this image is a motivation to never let the same happen again.
I wanted to stay and the only bug that remained in my system was the travel bug. But my younger sister was due to be married and, as an ex wedding photographer, I’d been drafted in to do the photography. Unfortunately, while I was able to procure a replacement ticket for my return flight to Melbourne from Hong Kong, the heavy demand on region flights due to the Olympic Games in Soul prevented me from being able to fly there from New Delhi.
I bought a ticket to Bangkok after being advised that, from there, it would be easy to catch a flight onto Hong Kong. I then fronted the same Indian beaurocrat who’d refused to grant me a visa during my previous interview. He was shocked to see me again and to be told of my travels in his country, without a visa. I put tthat nights plane ticket to Bangkok in front of him, together with my temporary Australian passport and a cash incentive (for his troubles, after all). He stamped my passport with the most pathetic, almost invisible stamp you could imagine and wrote directly onto my passport, in pencil, that I should be allowed to leave the country that night. It was as easy as that. But, from desperation comes inspiration.
Unfortunately, once I arrived in Bangkok I discovered that there were no flights available to Hong Hong. I was now stranded in Bangkok, with very little money. I did it tough, even spending one night in a slum by a river, being eaten alive by mosqitos. Eventually, after 19 days, I finally got a flight to Hong Kong. And you don’t want to know how I pulled that one off.
Once back in Australia I determined to work hard with the sole intention of saving enough money to travel again. One year later I was off again and continued to travel, on average every 18 months, for the next 12 years. Over the last 10 years my travels have been restricted to my own country. Australia is a wonderful country and I’ve been fortunate enough to have photographed some of its most spectacular locations. But, the bug has returned and I feel it will soon be time to venture overseas again.
TechNavio Insights has announced this week the release of the report “Business Intelligence (BI) Software Market in China 2008-2012”
According to TechNavio, ‘the market for BI in China is forecast to reach $210.8 million by 2012 from $107.6 million in 2008, growing at a CAGR of 18.3 percent over the forecast period’.
The truth is that Business Intelligence is an evolving strategy, and is presently going through the developmental phase in China. It is becoming an integral part of business processes of many large organizations, where the industries keep increasing their IT spending, and the government organizations support the development of IT infrastructure.
The United States and five other countries have tentatively agreed to meet this weekend to discuss what to do about Iran’s nuclear defiance of the UN Security Council, officials told The Associated Press.
The meeting would bring together political directors – who report directly to their foreign ministers – from the US, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany.
Officials from two of those countries said the meeting would likely be held in New York City on Saturday. The officials offered no details on the discussions, but the US and its Western allies are expected to push for a fourth set of sanctions to punish Teheran for defying Security Council demands that it mothball its uranium enrichment program. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because their information was confidential.
Confused in achieving its secret designs to become a super power of Asia, now India has started intimidating declared nuclear powers like Pakistan and China through threat of open war.In this regard, Indian Army Chief General Deepak Kapoor vocally revealed on December 29, 2009 that Indian Army “is now revising its five-year-old doctrine” and is preparing for a “possible two-front war with China and Pakistan.”
India has received a matching response from Islamabad. Responding to New Delhi’s open threat, on January 1, Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Kayani warned that the situation would get out of control in case of any dangerous adventurism of New Delhi. A day after, Pakistan’s Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (JCSC) Chairman Gen. Tariq Majid stated, “The Indian Army Chief’s statement exhibits a lack of strategic acumen”. He further said that such a path could “fix India on a self-destructive mechanism.” In this connection, taking cognizance of Indian new war-mongering style, on January 6, Gen. Kayani also chaired the meeting of corps commanders, and showed satisfaction over the operational preparedness of the Pakistan Army.
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s military and the political leadership has decided to be in active contact and to chalk out an effective strategy to counter hostile approach of India.
While taking notice of India’s tactics to disturb the regional balance of power in South Asia, the cabinet’s defence committee underscored that Pakistan would never allow its security to be jeopardised at any cost. It was decided in the meeting that until and unless South Waziristan operation and rehabilitation of war torn areas in Swat is not completed, no new military front would be opened and no foreign pressure would be tolerated in that respect.
As regards New Delhi’s belligerent approach, it is the result of Indian shattered hope to intimidate other regional countries especially Pakistan whom the former considers a continuous obstacle in the way of its ambitious policy. In fact, both the neighbouring adversaries are nuclear powers, Indians cannot ignore the principles of deterrence, popularly known as balance of terror.
In 1945, America dropped atomic bombs on Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as Tokyo had no such devices to retaliate. After the World War 11, nuclear weapons were never used. These were only employed as a strategic threat. During the heightened days of the Cold War, many crises arose in Suez Canal, Korea, Cuba and Vietnam when the US and the former Soviet Union were willing to use atomic weapons, but they stopped due to the fear of nuclear war which could culminate in the elimination of both the super powers. It was due to the concept of ‘mutually assured destruction’ that the two rivals preferred to resolve their differences through diplomacy.
Political strategists agree that deterrence is a psychological concept that aims to affect an opponent’s perceptions. In nuclear deterrence weapons are less usable as their threat is enough in deterring an enemy that intends to use its armed might.
A renowned scholar, Hotzendorf remarks that nuclear force best serves the interests of a state when it deters an attack.
It is mentionable that a few days after the November 26 tragedy of Mumbai, New Delhi, while embarking upon a hot pursuit policy towards Islamabad, under the pretext of that carnage, endeavoured to isolate Pakistan diplomatically in the comity of nations. For this purpose, India sent a number of diplomatic missions to various western capitals to convince them that Pakistan is officially behind Mumbai terror events, emphasising them to pressurize Islamabad in handing over the militants, responsible for the catastrophe.
What I’m interested in how you even handle this whole cyber-warfare issue. Hackers are trying to screw around with your network. This is normally a criminal problem. Yet what if the hackers are sanctioned, either directly or indirectly, by the Chinese government? Is this now a national security issue? Do certain laws go out the door and other ones come in? Whatever we choose, how do you reconcile your choice with how we handle terrorism?
Corruption is deepening: analysts – www.chinapost.com.tw
Rather than a “growing spread of the persistent rot,” the corruption has always been there. It’s just that the current focus on corruption is catching a few in its net. I’m also wondering if Professor Ren has bought into the golden age fallacy. The 20-year-old anti-graft campaign wasn’t brought in for no reason. Corruption has been a long standing social issue in China. I seriously doubt if the cadres of the Cultural Revolution were immune to using their position to their own advantage.
Mar. 23, 2007 – How China Purchased the United States. Part I
Posted in Commentary
On the evening of January 11, 1944, President Roosevelt was unable to give the annual presidential State of the Union speech before Congress so he instead gave it to the entire nation by way of his famous Fireside Chats. Cass Sunstein, a prominent liberal law professor at the University of Chicago called it “the most important speech of the century”. It’s importance is due to the fact that it is the first and most far reaching speech and endorsement of an American president for the legitimizing of the welfare state. The idea of the welfare state is that government MUST GUARANTEE the social and economic security for all citizens. The fore fathers and creators of the United States of America promised all citizens the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Nothing more! Originally the statement read: life, liberty and happiness. With the word happiness meaning financial well being and security for each individual. It wasn’t long before the delegates realized the mistaken assurance that promise made. No free man or free government could promise happiness (financial security) to it’s citizens. Not all individuals are endowed with the same abilities and talents. Nor are they all desirous of pursuing the same goals. So it follows that in the scheme of things some individuals will be more financially secure than others, and for a wide variety of reasons. One of the founding fathers was a prime example, Samuel Adams, the Father of the American Revolution was a brilliant orator and writer who could have chosen to turn his talent into a source of income and “happiness” (security) for himself and his family. Instead he chose to spend his talent and his time deriding the English Parliament and King George’s treatment of the colonies, and involving himself in other political matters. In that time politics was the realm of the wealthy because there was little pay for holding public office. Because of Adam’s choices his family lived on charity. When he was sent to Philadelphia as a delegate to the first Continental Congress the city fathers got together and purchased a suit of clothing for him to wear so his appearance would not embarrass them.
The Founding Father’s quickly added the words the “PURSUIT of happiness”. All men were guaranteed life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This belief was accepted by all from July 4, 1776 to the last century when our 32nd. President after being elected in 1932 set about initiating his New Deal with Americans and that New Deal he finally legitimized with his speech on January 11, 1944.
It is important for all citizens to recall the one thing the founding fathers knew and avoided when creating a new country and new government, a welfare state is in fact Socialism. And Socialism morphs easily into communism as the state takes from those who have to give to those who have not and in so doing reduces the haves to the level where they can not maintain the investments which produce jobs and job security forcing the state to therefore take over and operate these factories and businesses. The state owns all. All people are guaranteed a job for life and healthcare from birth to death. There are in theory no classes or divides, no people getting more than any others. Well anyone who has been paying the least bit of attention to Russia and China the two largest communist (socialist) countries in the world should be cognizant of the fact that there are very definite disparities between peoples and groups. They should also be aware of the standards of living of even what is in this country considered the middle class. Doctors and scientist are happy the state allows them a three room apartment and a salary of $100 per month. The factory worker gets a two room apartment and only $70 per month. People line up for hours at the grocery stores to be able to purchase a limited supply of groceries from the state own stores and the state own factories and the plants and the state own farms. There are shortages of every type consumer goods because production levels are very low. Why are they low? Why should any one work any harder than the laziest worker if all are going to be paid the same amount for their labors?
As for health care in Russia and China since the Iron Curtain fell we have been treated to the horror stories concerning the conditions in their hospitals. If we ever get to view the conditions of health care in China I am sure we will see the same. The polluting of the rivers in China have made headlines. these same rivers provide the drinking water for millions of people.
This is the welfare state that Franklin D. Roosevelt started and legitimized with his introduction of Social Security, a promised payment of funds to all elderly upon reaching age 65 based on how much they put into the system. (The dirty little secret of Social Security that most Americans don’t realize is that every cent a person has put into the system thru pay roll deductions is returned to that person after 2 to 2 1/2 years and after that it is nothing more than Welfare for the Elderly with the younger workers picking up the tab. I hear all the time” I deserve this because I paid into it”. The answer is , “Yes you paid into the fund but certainly you are getting much more back.”
The Social Security Act was quickly followed by several others that would come to be known as “entitlements” 1)a payment to widows and orphans from this same fund called a Survivors Benefit. Having had experience with the Survivors Benefits I can tell you they are generous enough that a widow and her children can live well enough if not extravagantly. In fact it was President Reagan in 1981 who stopped paying the benefits past age 18 to surviving children who went to college.
2) a Medicaid Bill providing health care to the needy and poor. A bill I fully support and feel should be expanded for the needy children who will be the future workers and supporters of all this largess.
3) guarantee of funds to those who are disabled and unable to work. The only problem with this program is the large disparity in what is considered a disability.
I admit these are all worthy causes but they are like that second bathroom, nice to have if you can afford it. The thing is we the tax payers can not afford them. We couldn’t then because we were in a depression and we surely can not now given what has been done to the programs and the funding for the programs. In the beginning the payment into the Social Security account from a workers pay check was only one half of 1%. Another fact of life then was that most people did not reach age 65 so it was deemed a “safe” age for retirement and promise of payment of benefits which of course would not need to be paid. Things have changed considerably over the years. With advances in medical care and then the Medicare Bill which came along in 1965 people began to live much longer. It is not unusual for a person to receive Social Security Benefits for 10 or even 20 years after retirement. And though the payroll deductions into the Social Security Trust Fund is now up to 15% (7 1/2% from each the employee and the employer) the fact of any one person cashing out their contribution in 2+ years is still true.
World War II came along and the military requirements meant jobs were available for everyone. This prosperity continued into the 1950’s and 1960’s. Everyone was on top of the world and everyone remembered FDR. He was in fact all but a God to my parents and grandparents who had lived during the “Great Depression” and Roosevelt was credited with getting us out of the Great Depression. Well, really he did. He got us into a war and wars mean jobs and jobs mean money.
The prosperity of the 1950’s and 1960’s was also primarily due to the war. First, there were jobs during the war years and good money being made but no consumer goods being produced to spend it on so people had money in the ‘50’s for homes and appliances and cars and colleges for their kids. The government encountered a problem tho after the troops began returning home from the war that threatened another depression with more workers than jobs. The government solved this problem by offering the soldiers coming home a GI Bill for special schooling or college which ushered in a huge middle class in the United States which further added to the prosperity of the country for decades. The GI Bill was probably the only outstandingly prosperous and good legislative act of the government since the Constitution of the United States of Amrica was written. Itr made possible the United States as we known it today; a country whose citizens enjoy the highest standard of living in the world. The only shame is that our elected officials failed to make more of this wave of prosperity we at one time were riding.
Anyhow, getting back on topic, the second thing the government did which created jobs was to rebuild Europe with what was called the Marshall Plan (the greatest idea ever conceived after a war. Do read about it if you never have. The Marshall Plan did more to insure peace than any thing else ever could.) It wasn’t freeas we were taking back IOU”s from the Europeans for this help. So our factories kept producing and jobs were available into the 1960’s rebuilding Europe and then continuing into the 1980’s to supply the restored and gaining in prosperity of the European people with much wanted American products.
Enter President Lyndon Johnson who in 1965 made another welfare state deal with Americans with his Medicare Bill which guaranteed all elderly Americans health care for a very small monthly fee taken from the Social Security Franklin D. Roosevelt had given them. Johnson also expanded Medicaid which I grant was needed, I have always felt the poor and needy should be cared for. Then Johnson looked around and decided more “poor” kids needed to go to college and since the GI Bill wasn’t getting enough of the population in college now that there were fewer soldiers so he started the ball rolling towards the government stepping in and guaranteeing student loans. The money for students loans weren’t from the government, but were government backed and the government paid the interest on these loans until the student graduated and began paying back the loans themselves. The banking industry loved this bill! It was a sweetheart deal made in Heaven as far as they were concerned and they couldn’t lose because if the student defaulted then the government paid off the principle after paying the interest all those years. Billions of dollars are owed the government on defaulted student loans. (another story for another day).
The Medicare Bill did set up a separate tax for the so-called Medicare Trust Fund, but it basically operates the same as the Social Security Trust Fund and is stuffed with all but worthless T-Bills. Both extra tax systems are pay as you go schemes where those paying now are carrying the load for the present recipients. When more funds are taken in than are needed then they are to go into these trust funds. The funds are then taken out of the Trust Fund and used for current government expenses while being replaced with Treasury Notes, or promises of payment by the same government( read that: tax payers) from future taxes when the funds are needed. I suggest some of you take a good look at the predicted value of treasury notes in the future when they are “needed”. They ain’t got no value at all! And next year when the first of that huge group of so-called baby boomers (children born to the returning WWII veterans) start to retire and demand their Social Security the only place our government has to turn is to tax you the tax payer more, or to do what it has been doing for years now and that is sell more of our treasury notes and assets to China. We are selling our country to China thru buying far more from them than they are buying from us. Jobs that were once in the United States have now gone to China. Our government is spending more and more than it is taking in in taxes meaning the government must “borrow” this money from somewhere to pay the defitcit. Along comes China quite willing to take our governmentss IOU’s for its goods. Thus my title for this rant: China now OWNS the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA! Sincerely, BB
**John Marini, Professor of political science at The University of Nevada spoke at Hillsdale College and his speech was later printed in Hillsdale’s Imprimis Newsletter. This particular newsletter is what got inspired this post. For you not familiar with Imprimis Newsletter it has a monthly readership of 1,250,000. Hillsdale College’s motto is Educating for Liberty since 1844. Their roll call of speakers are some of the foremost experts in their fields. They have a web site if you too would like to receive their newsletter.
A captação líquida da caderneta de poupança, divulgada pelo Banco Central, atingiu R$ 30,4 bilhões no último ano. O resultado ficou 71,2% acima ao apurado um ano antes e é o segundo maior índice da série estatística, iniciada no ano de 1995.
O desempenho foi impulsionado pela melhora no cenário macroeconômica e pelo aumento do emprego e da renda ocorridos em 2009 e significou, principalmente, mais dinheiro para financiamento habitacional.
A notícia é um dos principais destaques nos jornais e cadernos de economia desta sexta-feira (8). Veja também as demais manchetes referentes a economia e finanças que são ou poderão ser assunto no mercado:
O Estado de S. Paulo
B1 – Tesouro reserva R$ 200 bilhões contra instabilidade em ano de eleição;
B3 – Captação da poupança cresce 71%;
B11 – Sócio ainda tenta barrar venda da Quattor;
B12 – Cimenteira Cimpor rejeita oferta de compra feita pela CSN;
B12 – Na ‘lista suja’, Cosan perde crédito do BNDES.
Folha de S. Paulo Dinheiro – FAT fecha ano no vermelho pela 1ª vez;
Dinheiro – BNDES suspende operações com a Cosan;
Dinheiro – Poupança teve 2ª melhor captação em 2009;
Dinheiro – Valorização: Petrobras é 9ª do mundo em valor de mercado;
Dinheiro – China sinaliza que vai subir taxa básica de juros;
Dinheiro – Cimenteira de Portugal recusa oferta da CSN.
O Globo Economia – Cristina Kirchner demite presidente do BC da Argentina por decreto.
Jornal do Brasil Economia – Bradesco aumenta capital social em R$ 2 bilhões.
Valor Econômico A9 – Argentina abre exceção à lei e por decreto afasta o presidente do BC;
B12 – Cosan deve entrar na justiça para ser retirada da ‘lista suja’;
C2 – BoE mantém juros e programa de socorro;
C3 – BIS alerta banqueiros sobre tomada excessiva de riscos;
D2 – Cardeneta tem a 2ª maior captação desde 1995;
D3 – Alberto Geyer intensifica ação para barrar fusão da Quattor.
Lijiang lies in the northwest of Yunan provice,527kilometers from Kunming,which is called “living fossil of Chinese classic music “.Lijiang is a tour spot in China even in the world.4thDec.,1997,Lijiang was approved to be the city of “World Culture Heritage”.It is the only exist “Dongba hieroglyphic writing”.
There are mountains and rivers crossing ,strange mountains and valleys in the territory of Lijiang.There are totally1033 square kilometers cover the spot.and 104 places are of value to exploit.And the most important scenic area are “two mountains,one river,one city,one lake”,that are Laojun mountain,Yulong mountain,Changjiang first river,Lijiang old city and Hugu lake.
News that the wife of Yao Ming (姚明), the Houston Rockets’ All-Star center, is pregnant has sent netizens rushing to predict Baby Yao’s height and gender in the hopes that the child will someday lead the national basketball team.
Zhang Chi, spokesman of the Shanghai Sharks, confirmed that Yao and Ye Li (simp叶莉trad葉莉), a former player on the Chinese women’s national basketball team, are expecting their first child. The Sharks were recently purchased by Yao.
“The couple appreciate the public’s concerns (about the expected baby),” said Zhang. “But to give Ye some space and peace of mind, the couple thinks it’s inconvenient to provide any further information.”
A report on Sina.com said Ye, who is 1.90 m in height, is expected to give birth sometime around May or June. But whether Ye will deliver the baby in the United States or in Shanghai is unknown.
“It is up to (the couple) to decide,” said Zhang.
In a Sina.com poll, over 74.2 percent of 46,000 participants said Yao’s child is likely to grow taller than 2.05 meters, while 33.2 percent said the baby will grow to more than 2.20 meters.
In a telephone interview with China Daily yesterday, Cong Xuedi, head coach of the Shanghai women’s basketball team, said she is so glad to hear about the news.
“Earlier I’ve asked Ye about this and she confirmed with me happily. I can tell that she is peacefully awaiting to become a mother,” Cong said yesterday.
The coach said that right now it is too early to predict how tall Baby Yao will grow.
“Usually you will have to wait for a baby to grow up until the age of 10 before you can know for sure how tall the child will be, using the calculation of the bone-age measurement,” said Cong, who used to coach Ye when Ye played for the women’s basketball team in Shanghai.
Both the 2.26-m-tall Yao and Ye, who tied the knot in August 2007, were children of professional athletes. Yao’s father, Yao Zuyuan, also a former Shanghai basketball team player, stands 2.08 meters tall. Yao’s 1.88-m-high mother, Fang Fengdi, was a former member of China’s national women’s basketball team.
The news that Yao will soon become a father was a hot story over the Internet yesterday, with netizens conveying best wishes to the 29-year-old center and hoping him an early recovery from a foot injury.
It is reported that Yao, who was in the US last week to attend a promotional campaign for the Shanghai Expo, has returned to Shanghai. As the owner of the Shanghai Sharks, he is expected to come to the stadium to support his club in the following weeks.
Hao Yuan Hotel is a siheyuan (courtyard) style hotel located in the hutongs of Dongcheng District. The hotel is huge and basically comprises the whole hutong. The exterior walls are dull and gray but once you step inside the courtyard it is cozy and welcoming. It is within walking distance to Oriental Plaza and Wangfujing shopping district.
During the Qing Dynasty, this used to be Empress Dowager Cixi’s eunuch Li Lianying’s house. Thereafter, Zhang Zizhong, a general who fought in the second Sino-Japanese War lived here. It was also Madame Deng Xiaoping’s house and office for a period of time and became a hotel in 1984. Today, it is a beautiful courtyard style hotel offering visitors a taste of living in a traditional courtyard style home.
旅遊資料/ If you go: (2007 年資料/ info from 2007)
門票/ Admission: free to walk around
地址/ Address: 北京市东城区史家胡同53号 (53 Shi Jia Hutong, Dongcheng District, Beijing)
交通路线/ Transportation: 地鐵5號綫，燈市口站/ subway line 5, Deng Shi Kou station
“The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist” (1).
As US president Barack Obama became the latest in a long line of former US president’s in denial, by blaming China for the Copenhagen climate change talks fiasco (2) (3), many in the informed world looked on incredulously at the audicity of the man (4).
It was clear that no government in the world would have ceded to the unreasonable demands the US put on the table, particularly as they was offering nothing tangible in return (5).
But one would have had difficulty in arriving at this conclusion from reading the the vast majority of a compliant corporate media’s parroting of Obama who was clearly trying to convince the rest of the world of his innocence whilst deflecting blame on to China.
Obama’s attempt at shifting the blame was therefore a conjuring trick - a deception.
The historical reality is the US’s role post WW2 has been one of imperialist overseer that characterizes and demonises all of its potential competitors and “enemies” as “dictatorships” (or derivations thereof) as the basis for its propaganda of control (6).
This has, for example, involved the US characterizing the Vietnamese nationalist struggle for self-determination and independence as “communist” (7).
Similarly, more recently, the US has characterized the resistance in Afghanistan under the umbrella term “Taliban”, and routinely attempts to undermine the legitimate results of democratic elections throughout the world if they happen not to coincide with global US geopolitical and economic strategic interests (8).
The Western media was up to its usual tricks in reproducing US government propaganda in their attempts to undermine China during the 2008 Olympic Games. During this time, the Western media sensationalized stories about pollution and the murder of a US citizen in Beijing (9), and then accused the Chinese of attempting to censor them (10).
The media also focused a disproportionate amount of attention on Obama’s predecessors’ comments emphasizing China’s alleged human rights record whilst ignoring the US’s. Bush was widely reported as saying the following shortly before he arrived in Beijing for the Games:
“America stands in firm opposition to China’s detention of political dissidents, human rights advocates and religious activists. We speak out for a free press, freedom of assembly, and labour rights not to antagonise China’s leaders, but because trusting its people with greater freedom is the only way for China to develop its full potential” (11).
But what the media rarely highlights is the US’s close ties to the regime in Egypt, whose respect for “freedom of assembly and labour rights” is shown by its internal repression, and to the Saudi royal family, who ruthlessly crush the slightest flickering of democratic sentiment (12).
They also ignore, with the odd exception, the continuing scandal of the US gulag at Guatanamo Bay which remains intact under Obama with at least 17,000 prisoners beyond the reach of justice (13). President Barack Obama speaks at the U.S. Marine Corps base in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press)
Also unmentionable in the media is the fact that since coming to power, Obama has opposed habeas corpus, demanded more secret government and excused torture. One of his senior US intelligence officials in Latin America is accused of covering up the torture of an American nun in Guatemala in 1989; another is a Pinochet apologist (14). ibid.
In Pakistan, the number of civilians killed by US missiles called drones has more than doubled since Obama took office, and all over the world America’s violent assault on innocent people, directly or by agents, has been stepped up. (15).
In Afghanistan, the US “strategy” of killing Pashtun tribespeople (the “Taliban”) has been extended by Obama to give the Pentagon time to build a series of permanent bases right across the devastated country where, says Secretary Gates, the US military will remain indefinitely (16). ibid.
In Iraq, the country that has been reduced to a river of blood, as many as 70,000 troops will remain “for the next 15 to 20 years” (17).
US criticisms of China are therefore hypocritical.
What the media hides from the public, is the fact that the world’s imperial power, albeit a rapidly declining one, is representative of brutal form of dictatorship that US author Naomi Wolf argues is characteristic of fascism (18).
Some dictatorships are overt and others less so. Some, like the ex-Stalinist USSR, was totalitarian in nature, whilst others rely on a compliant media as a way to convince the populace that they are free and therefore not living in a dictatorship (19).
In this way, the idea is that the powerful within society who control what Karl Marx termed the “means of production”, convince people within “democracies” that they are free, worthy and deserving, by virtue of the fact that they have the right to vote for either Tweedledee or Tweedledum once every five years, whilst simultaneously reinforcing the idea that other people who live in what the democratic world deem as “dictatorships” are not free, not worthy and are thus undeserving (20).
This illustrates that populations can be, and indeed are, controlled and manipulated to act on behalf of the rulers whose interests they ultimately serve.
Within the unspoken US dictatorship, vast armies of wage slaves toil for giant Western corporations who profit from the cheap labour that the other major dictatorship, China, delivers.
In this way, the US benefits from its relationship with China.
So why all the fuss?
The answer is that China isn’t just any old dictatorship, it is now an imperial rival to the US (21).
China’s rapid economic growth is destabilising the existing global balance of power. Measured by market exchange rates, China’s share of global national income has risen from 2.6 percent in 1980 to around 6 percent today (22).
On another measure that is better at capturing the absolute size of national economies, China’s share is more like 11 percent (23). ibid.
This is still way below that of the US which, on the same two measures, accounts for 25 and 21 percent of global economic output. Nevertheless, China’s economic rise is reshuffling the relations between states. For example, Third World states producing raw materials needed by China no longer need to go cap-in-hand to the US-dominated World Bank for loans and accept intrusive “conditionalities” that require them to reshape their economy and policies along neoliberal lines (24).
This doesn’t mean that Chinese investment in Africa or Latin America is benevolent or disinterested. It is a highly state-controlled capitalist country securing its supplies of natural resources (25). ibid.
But the fact remains that a lot of the hullaballoo about China is motivated less by concern for human rights, or Tibet or the environment for example, but by fear of Chinese power (26). ibid.
Obama’s stance in relation to China, as evidenced by his attitude at Copenhagen, appears to be one of engagement, but the real hidden message seems to be also – remember who’s boss and don’t throw your weight around (27).
In all this, it seems to be that Western powers are in denial. They behave as if things are still as they were immediately after the fall of the Soviet Union, when the US and its allies could do what they liked.
But things have changed. US power is now in decline. The West faces challengers increasingly confident of their own strength. If they’re pushed too hard, then, as the fighting in the Caucasus showed, they’ll bite back (28). ibid.
Vast swathes of central and South America are doing just that.
The days when the US could dismissively refer to central America as their back-yard to be exploited, are over.
A few years ago Donald Rumsfeld when describing Venezuela with all of the self-appointed arrogance of an imperial overseer, said: ” Why did God put our oil in other people’s countries?” No US politician will dare repeat such words.
Venezuela’s crime in the eyes of the US was that the people of that country democratically elected somebody who was prepared to stand up to US power and the economic imperatives and ideology that underpin it. The fact that the president of the country, Hugo Chavez, has been recalled for election on numerous separate ocassions and won every one of them, is largely unmentionable in the western corporate media.
Chavez, perceived by the US as a dictator, achieved his successive election victories despite a campaign of vilification within a privatized media largely controlled by oligarch’s sympathetic to US imperialism who openly backed a coup attempt against him in 2002 (29).
At the recent Summit of the America’s, Chavez, briefly came face-to-face with the devil who attempted to pursuade the rest of the world of his non-existence. During his brief meeting with Obama, Chavez proposed that the two men ”work for peace” suggesting that they “get a team together to analyze the problem of the planned construction of US military bases in Colombia” (30).
The result of the meeting?
Obama plans to install seven military bases in that country (31). ibid.
In Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Pakistan, Obama continues Bush’s policies of war, domination and subjugation. Meanwhile, poverty, unemployment and inequality that grow daily in the land of the free, are unmentionables. But despite this, a compliant media continue to feed the myth that it is only the official enemies of the US which are the dictatorships.
Hugo Chavez’s respone to the US accusation that he is a dictator?
“I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I’m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, “They are going to bite us.” And Quixote wisely answers, “Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping.” I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy (32). ibid.
Dealing with China’s Hangover – the sobering reality
I nearly got the date wrong on my comment – my goodness, it’s 2010! Happy New Year, everyone…
By my own-admission, the New Year’s Eve piece (China on Steroids, Japan on Hallucinogens) I wrote was a look at China through rose-tinted glasses. If you have not yet read this piece, I urge you to skim read it before reading today’s comment. Aptly written on the eve of New Year celebrations, it’s comforting to bask in the radiant glow of glorious China when the champagne is flowing and the fireworks are fizzing but, in the cold sobering light of the morning, the rhetoric must face the harsh reality of what lies ahead.
While I championed the tide of reform and investment that will undoubtedly occur in the financial services industry, it is this sector which also faces the most challenges. Firstly, in asset prices we have a huge conundrum in China, largely because we do not know exactly what is going on due to the opacity of data and the effects of government policy, on a central or local level. Bloomberg reported Fitch as implying that China Banks’ Capital Likely More Strained as the rating agency contemplates downgrades to the sector due to lack of transparency in the Chinese bank balance sheets as loan growth seems to be increasingly fueled by “off-balance sheet” transactions… hmmm… funny complicated products and a “growing pool of hidden credit risk” – I think we’ve heard that somewhere before haven’t we? There is no doubt in my mind that Non-Performing Loans (NPL’s) on bank balance sheets will rear their ugly head at some point over the next year or two.
Andrew Xie thinks that asset prices may rise in 2010 and hit new highs before being decimated on the jagged rocks of inflation in 2011. Granted, he’s been singing the same tune for a while now, but when I hear the theme repeating itself over and over again from different corners, it’s time to take a long hard think about it.
As many China property optimists cite, a large number of Chinese pay cash for homes or put down large cash deposits, this puts a degree of support to asset prices. But there is only so long markets can ultimately disassociate themselves from the reality seen by the overwhelming majority of the population, we found this out the hard way in the US. A fluidly constructed, Bloomberg article by Dexter Roberts has a few little hidden gems in it:
Millions of Chinese are pursuing property with a zeal once typical of house-happy Americans. Some Chinese are plunking down wads of cash for homes. Others are taking out mortgages at record levels. Developers are snapping up land for luxury high- rises and villas, and the banks are eagerly funding them. Some local officials are even building towns from scratch in the desert, certain that demand won’t flag. And if families can swing it, they buy two apartments: one to live in, one to flip when prices jump further.
Although parallels with other bubble markets, the China bubble is not quite so easy to understand. In some places, demand for upper middle class housing is so hot it can’t be satisfied. In others, speculators keep driving up prices for land, luxury apartments, and villas even though local rents are actually dropping because tenants are scarce. What’s clear is that the bubble is inflating at the rich end, while little low- cost housing gets built for middle and low-income Chinese.
In Beijing’s Chaoyang district, which represents a third of all residential property deals in the capital, homes now sell for an average of almost $300 per square foot. That means a typical 1,000-square-foot apartment costs about 80 times the average annual income of the city’s residents.
Chinese consumers, fearing inflation will return and outstrip the tiny interest they earn on their savings, have pursued property ever more aggressively. Companies in the chemical, steel, textile, and shoe industries have started up property divisions too: The chance of a quick return is much higher than in their primary business.
“When you sit down with a table of businessmen, the story is usually how they got lucky from a piece of land,” says Andy Xie, an independent economist who once worked in Hong Kong as Morgan Stanley’s top Asia analyst. “No one talks about their factories making money these days.”
The government is reluctant to crack down too hard because construction, steel, cement, furniture, and other sectors are directly tied to growth in real estate. In November, for example, retail sales of furniture and construction materials jumped more than 40 percent. At the December Central Economic Work Conference, an annual policy-setting confab, officials said real estate would continue to be a key driver of growth.
Analysts are divided over the probabilities of such a crash, but even real estate executives are getting nervous. Wang Shi, chairman of top developer China Vanke Co., has warned repeatedly in recent weeks about the risk of a bubble. In his most recent comments he expressed fear that the bubble might spread far beyond Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzen.
Does this sound like sustainable asset growth to you – in real (inflation-adjusted) terms? In monetary terms, the demand may be genuine (while few alternatives exist for domestic investors in China), but, just like the fireworks and champagne on New Year’s Eve, it’s not a sustainable pleasure – what goes up must eventually come down, after the party comes the hangover – either in absolute terms or by inflation.
On his boxing day piece (The Pace of Change), Michael Pettis talks about the trade-off between social stability and change and it’s role in post-crisis liquidation. He differentiates between the US-style exit strategy (default and move on) and the Japanese model (zombie companies, slow grind) and the social implications of both. The reality is he’s talking about propensities to the velocity of money – or inflation. How China chooses to face the looming prospect of the deflation / inflation challenge is crucial to understanding the economic interplay in the region and China’s role in the Global Economy.
Macro Data to Watch:
US housing numbers were OK last week but need to verify if this trend of improving employment will continue into the new year.
Singaporean GDP -6.8% QoQ – oops, that was not expected.
Inflation Numbers Thailand and Indonesia.
US ISM Manufacturing numbers – if it stays roughly where it is (just above 50) that’ll be fine thank you very much. Would not want to see this dip below 50 or shoot above 60.
Markets
Whoops, S&P slipped on a banana skin at the end of the day. That was not really supposed to happen was it? Anyway, it’s a new year, “The January Effect” will be in full swing as new asset managers with new money and new mandates look to plug their investors’ money into something promising.
Expect a little volatility going into earnings season, but I was wrong last season – we saw very little volatility for Q3 reporting.
Global Stocks to Watch:
The Banks:
The Aussie Bank, NAB, may make a play for UK nationalized bank Northern Rock?
Re-introduction of Glass-Steagall?! This would force investment banks to all be broken up.
In Riga there is a black box in the middle of city hall square, both ugly and disturbing. Made of concrete, it looks like a parking lot, but in fact it is the Latvian National Museum of Occupation, 1940-1991.
There seems to be an architectural trend for ugly buildings dedicated to grave events. You will find the Monument of Shoah in Berlin a daedalus of tombstones, leaving future generations wondering the purpose of those erected stones like at Stonehenge.
And yet the purpose of this writing is not architecture, but occupation. What does it mean to be occupied, and especially to occupy, as invader, conqueror or persistent guest?
Invasions are like winds. Some endure for days and weeks, and will rewrite maps or destroy armies. Others are brief and have the brutality of unexpected storms. But ultimately a peaceful morning will let us wonder about this urge of invading, and leaving behind some statues, perhaps generations of blond children.
Thinking of Latvia, there have been two winds, one brief and violent, and the latter relentless, which left the country divided over its true future and belonging. Its statue of liberty is indeed holding in her outstretched hands, three stars, and it is an exerting task, as Russians of Latvia are stirring.
German invasions have the quality of their defects. Meaning that unlike the French ones, which leave women dreaming of gallant officers, trees of liberty and civil laws, with the Germans, there is no such a thing. Germans are bad invaders, because they don’t last and have a manic habit of destroying instead of creating.
German invasions are brutal and stupid. They have the violence of today’s youngsters who would knife a man for a smile. Fortunately German eagle is too heavy to fly for a long time, so that armies are routed, leaving local populations wondering what happened. Of course this is only part of the story, as Germans tend to invade again as tourists, in motorised columns of cars and buses.
With Russians, it is altogether different. They invade brutally, but with a romantic quality. Their deep nature has the quality of their opera and dances. Both energetic and wild, Russian culture is about embracing rather than punching, even if some embraces lead to unpleasant places north of the polar circle.
Russians are playing chess, drinking and smoking, all in a dazzling combination of invasion and natural catastrophe. They will leave Soviet architecture buildings behind, which are recycled in European Economic Community business centre, as for example, the Communist Party headquarter of Riga has been renamed World Trade Centre with humor.
But they will leave remarkable achievements of education, knowledge and hygiene. The credo of Communism is indeed education, sport and hygiene. Some can argue that the price is heavy, as Communism has forgotten breakfast, lunch and dinner. But nonetheless only Russians can have that quality of culture and endurance.
Being an invader is not difficult, but Romans have taught us that what makes a great invader is culture and long-term project. Romans invaded brutally, but erected marvelous cities with running water, and assimilation of local population was rapid, but for Egyptians. With time we have lost that quality of invasions.
The last great invasions were perhaps the Crusades, as some went there not only for gold, but for redemption. Spirituality yet played a role. Later invasions, like conquest of Africa by France and England, lacked that subtlety. Industrialised countries conquer territories as potential markets, not for spiritual or romantic reasons.
T.E. Lawrence argued in his Seven Pillars of Wisdom that the French were extremely bad invaders, compared to the elitist British. French are unruly, brutal bastards, but they have Republican values, and armies of devoted leftist teachers. They build great things, and have local elite contribute actively to a kind of foreign French metropolis, for example Saigon or Algiers.
German colonial past is small, but striking. Who but a German would build in Namibian desert a factory of sausage and beer? There is that obstinate typical German need to export a life style, to stamp it with Made in Germany. Today they invade the world with their cars, at least something more useful than pigs in a desert.
What truly makes for a great invader, and a better quality of occupation, is cultural flexibility. Romans did not argue about religions as long as the tax were paid. With the Jews the problem was that for reasons of money and monotheism, Roman laws could not work their magic of integration. And yet apart from the example of Egypt and Judea, Roman laws made citizens out of hundreds of million foreign people.
The European Community is an invader of sorts, with armies of commissioners and lawyers, building a tower of Babel, but with limited success so far. One cannot conquer without a cultural ideal, and the EEC has only the culture of profit.
The American Empire had the potential to invade and last, but alas, since the late 50s its military industrial lobby has grown so powerful, as a state within the state, that instead of exporting only movies, candy and personal computers, there is that urge to export bombs and missiles, and to use them liberally on civil populations. This is really too bad, because American people are so likable, but being invaded by them is like Disneyland, you have to run for shelter which is made difficult by the gross consumption of MacDonalds.
We are experiencing a new invasion of Chinese. The Empire of the Middle has become factory of the world. So far, its invasion of African territories and industrialised countries markets has been relentless, but not harmless. Again to be likable, Chinese invasion would have to be more culturally flexible. Instead of manufacturing only goods, China should propose a real alternative to European 19th century industrial values. So far, there is nothing like that.
Invasions are like winds, they can turn you into a fool, or make you dream about vast oceans and green forests.
Sydney – The appointment of five provincial-level Chinese Communist Party chiefs in early December is a reminder that the ascension of China’s next generation of leaders, who will take power in 2012, may be the most significant development in Chinese politics since Deng Xiaoping’s reign begin in 1978. The upcoming generation of leaders will be the first with little or no personal memory of the turmoil and hardship endured during the Mao Zedong years. Forgetting that history might doom China to repeat the mistakes of the past; but, for better or worse, it might also ease constraints and set its leaders free.
All five appointees were born after the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949. Two of them, Hu Chunhua and Sun Zhengcai, are only 46 years old. This is in line with the Party’s recently announced policy that the next generation of leaders should have an average age of around 55 years, with up to four top positions filled by leaders not yet in their fifties. The Party’s aim is to ensure that it remains energetic and dynamic as China rises.
This seems a wise decision. Chinese leadership over the past decade and a half has been about fine-tuning and maintaining the momentum of Deng’s state-led development model, launched after the Tiananmen protests of 1989. In this respect, China’s third and fourth generation of leaders, under the technocrats Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, have been competent but unimaginative.
But the viability of Deng’s model is nearing its end, and China is now addicted to inefficient state-led fixed investment and unsustainable export-led growth, rather than domestic consumption, to generate jobs and growth. Progress on further structural reforms – such as currency and capital-account liberalization and weaning state-controlled industries off state capital – has been slow, and new initiatives have been piecemeal rather than comprehensive.
Likewise, since the mid-1990’s, China’s foreign policy has been cautious rather than bold. Both Jiang and Hu have faithfully followed Deng’s dictum to “Hide capacity and nourish obscurity.” Although increasingly assertive in Africa and Latin America, China largely remains a free-rider under the American security umbrella.
The older generations see such caution as prudence, and that conservatism is reflected in China’s current leaders. The lack of big-picture reform attests to the older generations’ collective fear that fundamental structural changes will bring disruption and chaos, threatening the Party’s hold on power. They still remember the suffering of the Mao years, when China headed in the wrong direction – and tried to do too much too quickly – and they vividly recall how the Tiananmen protests brought the regime to its knees, and how urban labor unrest erupted when centrally managed state businesses were merged or closed down in the 1990’s.
Without personal experience of China’s recent traumatic history, the next generation will be more confident and assertive. Schooled in economics, politics, and law, rather than engineering, they will seek to accelerate China’s rise and transformation, viewing caution as paralysis. Even now, emerging leaders argue that China is moving too slowly on economic reform and foreign-policy goals. For better or worse, they will not be restrained by the same fear of unintended consequences when it comes to change and experimentation.
But the foreign-policy consequences could be even greater. Having grown up in a China that is now accepted as a legitimate great power, the new generation of leaders will be more impatient about China resuming its place as the paramount power in Asia. While older statesmen take pride in how far China has come, younger Party figures and elites – especially those who have returned from American and other Western graduate schools – are frustrated by that China’s strategic position in Asia and status within global and regional institutions remain relatively weak, despite the country’s rising economic power.
For example, much of the talk that China should take the lead in regional institutions, and that Chinese ships should have a greater presence in vital sea lanes such as the Malacca Straits and even the Indian Ocean comes from the younger generation. The younger Party leaders are also more impatient when it comes to a timeframe for winning back Taiwan.
China is currently in a holding pattern. But that will end when the next generation of leaders assumes power in 2012. When their time comes, the world will be dealing with a much more unpredictable power than the one we know now.
world’s richest man now re-cast as a global philanthropist, has pronounced his verdict on the Chinese internet row, telling the ABC television network’s Good Morning America that web censorship in China is ‘very limited’.
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Lijiang lies in the northwest of Yunan provice,527kilometers from Kunming,which is called “living fossil of Chinese classic music “.Lijiang is a tour spot in China even in the world.4thDec.,1997,Lijiang was approved to be the city of “World Culture Heritage”.It is the only exist “Dongba hieroglyphic writing”.
President Barack Obama speaks at the U.S. Marine Corps base in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press)