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Identity theft is essentially nonexistent in China.

Bull Shit.

Stop shilling for China.

A rain shadow desert.
Any "countries where that rain would otherwise have landed" already got most of the moisture out of the air, which is why that place is a desert.

Cloud seeding is part of Chinese plan to build a Green Great Wall to stop the spread of the desert and the sandstorms.
Which seems to be doing something, at least in the sense that it is apparently lowering the water table in the areas where trees are planted.

Or that is at least what the opposition to the forestation program claims, suggesting instead simply fencing off the area and "nurturing the land by the land itself".
How would that create trees in areas which were "treeless in the last several thousand years", or how would temporary fencing off prevent sandstorms (even should grassland work that way) once the fences are removed and the grasslands are once again used for cattle grazing... the article doesn't mention that.
Then again, water levels have been dropping long before forestation project started. And trees are supposed to keep the water in the ground...

On the other hand, Epoch Times is more than a little a Falun Gong paper.
I.e. Whatever Chinese government does is wrong. While whatever Falun Gong does might get them arrested and "reeducated" by the government. Or harvested.

In any case, weather modification is being done in order to provide water for the Green Wall in the area which got desertified as the water from Shiyang River was used for irrigation upstream decades ago.

Yeah this definitely discourages me: http://www.npr.org/sections/th...
And 3 years before that they said it was 10%: http://china.org.cn/environmen...
So do you believe it's really 20% or actually higher?

If you don't believe that it's a problem perhaps you can convince these bunch:
http://articles.latimes.com/20...
http://www.theglobeandmail.com...

See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

I dunno if AC will check back or not - but in no particular order:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/
http://www.reuters.com/
http://rt.com/
http://www.cbc.ca/
http://www.news.com.au/
http://www.dailytelegraph.com....
http://news.sky.com/
http://kurdishdailynews.org/
http://rt.com/
http://www.jpost.com/
http://www.aljazeera.com/
http://www.china.org.cn/
http://www.scientificamerican....
http://timesofindia.indiatimes...
http://english.pravda.ru/
http://www.projectcensored.org...
http://www.arabtimesonline.com...

I think I've covered the best - be aware, some national sites are heavy into propaganda. Pravda very much so, RT somewhat less so.

Depending on your own interests - you might type in some country in a Google search, and add "times" or "post" or "news". From time to time, I do something like that - the earthquake in Tibet for instance. https://duckduckgo.com/?t=pale... That search offered up a number of sites, but I didn't add any of them to my feeds. Note that many of the hits are very politicized, but you can still find Tibetan news sources among them.

Have fun!

Yeah so there's this giant market called "China"....

The largest smart phone market, actually. Samsung has a market share of 21%, while Apple has a market share of 6%. China has several domestic vendors also.

China builds a reactor in under 24 months. The completed cost of an AP-1000 reactor in China is $2 billion as of 2009.

According to this construction on China's first AP-1000 reactor started in 2009 and is expected to be completed in October of 2014.

But does every single budget item and all tax policies and rates need to be on the table and without any sacred cows? HELL YES. And then the specific choices should be wise ones.

Without firm specifics at hand, I still feel very confident that there is 3% of utterly useless fat that could be trimmed from science funding. That's all we're talking about here.

Well, if you are so confident on year after year budgets, please compute what percentage the US research budget will be after 10 years of 3%/pa "fat reduction".

Then see how long 'til China overtakes US, given that 2011 saw China's R&D budget increasing 9.2% on a year-to-year basis.

How about stuff like this: http://china.org.cn/environment/2011-11/07/content_23843392.htm

I'd read it as the problem is very serious since the official is allowed to actually say it on an official website.

I see some increase in environmental interest in China.

See: http://www.china.org.cn/environment/2011-11/07/content_23843392.htm

Wan Bentai, the chief engineer for China's Ministry of Environmental Protection, said heavy metal from smelter chimneys, water run-offs and tailings has polluted in total about 10 percent of the countryâ(TM)s farmland, and the pollution levels have exceeded government limits, according to Southern Metropolitan Daily.

To me when they are even allowed to say and publish stuff like this it means the situation is so crap that the top are considering it a serious enough matter. And such announcements are made to help prepare the way for possibly draconian/drastic actions in the future.

They're also building more nuclear power stations.

You do know that the income gap in China is narrowing, right? And it's widening in the US? Conditions in China are bad, but getting better. Conditions for workers in America are much better, but getting worse. Who's getting hurt here?

This is an expression of the free market at work, with a good dose of unintentional consequences for the corporate masters who shipped all the jobs overseas in hopes of getting cheap labour, thereby increasing the value of that labour, and slowly improving the lot of the workers there (at the expense of the workers back home, of course). All this crying and gnashing of teeth ignores the fact that conditions in China are improving for workers, and American workers don't like that.

The real problem isn't the shipping of jobs to one part of the world or another. The real problem is executive compensation. The leeches at the top pay themselves hundreds or possibly thousands of times the wages of the people at the bottom of the supply chain, instead of limiting themselves to something reasonable (but still quite a lot of money) and making sure that everyone else in the chain makes a decent standard of living.

That's not true.

Conditions are improving for Chinese workers though, there's no denying that. Urban living standards have risen in absolute terms, but the gap is growing fast.

Well... it could well be that Apple or other hardware buyers low-bidding the Chinese manufacturers.

Edy Jianto, general manager at Flextronics Electronics Technology (Suzhou) Co Ltd, estimated that many multinational companies enjoy a gross profit margin of between 50 to 60 percent while Chinese contract manufacturers have an average margin of around 3 percent.

Do you think you will place much emphasize in environment and labor conditions if your margin is only 3% and wouldn't you try to do whatever you can to circumvent the Chinese environmental and labor laws?.

I'm not surprised at all. I think it's a major problem. I just think that blaming the customer is not the way to go. The polluter should be in trouble - and maybe their prices go up as a result.

Well... it could well be that Apple or other hardware buyers low-bidding the Chinese manufacturers.

Edy Jianto, general manager at Flextronics Electronics Technology (Suzhou) Co Ltd, estimated that many multinational companies enjoy a gross profit margin of between 50 to 60 percent while Chinese contract manufacturers have an average margin of around 3 percent.

Do you think you will place much emphasize in environment and labor conditions if your margin is only 3% and wouldn't you try to do whatever you can to circumvent the Chinese environmental and labor laws?.

March 15, 2011:
"By measures of output, China edged by the United States to become the world's largest manufacturing country last year, ending US dominance over the last 110 years, according to a study Monday by economic research firm IHS Global Insight."
http://www.china.org.cn/business/2011-03/15/content_22147078.htm

I know that intellectual property is (for some bizarre reason I can't fathom) panned on Slashdot, but it takes real work to make digital media. Based on your comment, it seems that even "for profit" piracy is condoned. I suppose the ultimate result of your argument is devaluing intellectual work in favor of physical products, even when IP-based products are more important. I mean, the whole reason the US manufacturing sector is so large (despite having far fewer workers in manufacturing than China) is because of computers and software. But, no, no, go ahead and take a swing at intellectual property in favor of "real" manufactured products. And feel free to bitch about tractor based farming and fertilizer in favor of "good old muscle with a shovel and hoe".

I'm sorry, but I just had to point out how silly your suggestion was in light of these facts.

We, Norway and Denmark, don't offer our children to outsiders... Why would we? We're wealthy and stable nations.

Norway is even richer than Sweden, and we pay mothers a monthly stipend for each child until it reaches 18 years of age. Not to mention the lump sump of money given at birth ($9000) to help you get started. Oh, if you're a working mother the state offers paid maternity leave for 12-16 months, fathers are also offered paid paternal leave.

In a country where religion is irrelevant, college education is free, teenage pregnancy uncommon, welfare covers cradle-to-grave. Why would we have any children to offer foreigners? This is the same for Denmark as well. The UN however ranks Norway the best country to live in, in general, and specifically for mothers...

In China this would be pointless because why would the government care what their people thought?

The Chinese government cares a lot about what their people think, that's why they have a lot of censorship. The Chinese government is well aware of history and of what happened to previous Chinese governments. Piss off too many (e.g. the peasants) and you die.

FWIW, a lot of the Chinese people support their own government (just look at the patriots out in full force during the Olympics).

Why?
1) The censorship and brainwashing. Control what people see and that affects what they think, and that's how you keep them supporting you.
2) Because there have actually been significant positive changes. Railways and highways have been built, many of the poor have benefited from those. Sure there's lots of bad stuff happening, but they can just look at a lot of other countries and go "We're doing better" or "we're doing pretty good given the hand we've been dealt".
3) They can see that at least some parts of the Government are trying to improve things for China, and not just a corrupt few. They're in the process of building very many nuclear reactors so that they don't have to burn so much coal and have so much pollution.

As for accountability: a number of high ranking officials actually get executed for corruption or screwing up big time[1]. Sure maybe at the very top there are untouchables, but is it really so different in the US or other countries? And how high up is this US guy anyway: http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20101104/NEWS/101109939/1078&ParentProfile=1062
They're possibly even slightly afraid of the people, they abolished the agricultural tax: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-03/06/content_422126.htm
http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/1274.html

It's not that rosy, there are lots of problems and it could fall apart: http://www.china.org.cn/china/2010-01/21/content_19282590.htm
That "houses are way too expensive" problem does exist in many other countries too though.

You can see that many of the Chinese leaders are trying though. Wish my Government (in Malaysia) was even trying to improve the country- so far they've been doing a lot of stupid/bad things. The guy at the top says lots of nice stuff, but so far it's just been talk, whereas his underlings say and do pretty bad stuff.

[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/09/AR2007070900689_pf.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10535226
http://www.newkerala.com/news/world/fullnews-87512.html

Basically the entire computer's assembled in a sweatshop by barely literate people who are being paid jack-shit to assemble a "rich-boy toy" for some perceived fat cat in the US who sleeps on piles of money.

People talk about Detroit autoworkers exactly the same way. Doesn't mean much, really.

Talk about them that way -- okay; they're not exactly in the same league though.

UAW autoworkers earn, on average, $28 per hour. That's average, some get much more. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070924073107AAuGk8O

Chinese sweat shop labor, e.g. at Foxconn, make about $168-176 per month. http://www.china.org.cn/china/2010-06/07/content_20199987.htm

What a fascinatingly oversimplified view you have of China. I guess it escaped your attention that they have the fastests-growing middle class in the world.

Is there something bad about boiling a subject down to it's essence?

Also, please provide a citation for your claim. I tried googling "fastests-growing middle class" and only got two sketchy articles mentioning that China's middle class was growing.. none of them giving any superlative comparisons.

When I do searches related to Chinese income however, I learn that average per capita income has only recently passed the $3k USD watermark, and the Urban-rural income gap is the widest it's been in 30 years.

I re-iterate. China can make more cheap electronic goods because of bargain basement labor costs. There is no magic involved. If people are being paid less for their labor, then they have critically less money with which to buy gadgets.. especially since their need to eat and put a roof over their head is not mitigated.

You get what you pay for, and the Chinese economy pays among the lowest margins in the world to it's staggering population. If their government really believes they can live without the global community or basic Internet Access, then let them buy their own computers with no money and enjoy their national 403 page.

China on Friday raised retail prices of electricity by an average of 0.025 yuan (0.31 of a US cent) per kilowatt-hour (kwh) for the first time since May 2005. Yes, it is 3 years old. Their prices have not gone up that much.

They are paying $.0031 / kw-h. Here in Colorado, we pay about .07/kw-h. On the east coast, they pay .15/kw-h. Their are few lower price states than Colorado. Washington is one of them at .03 kw-h. They are 100x what China costs. Why? for a number of reasons. 1) China has ZIP pollution control. They will not buy them from anybody in the west. They want us to give it to them. 2) currently, they derive about 90-95% of their energy from Coal and Natural Gas. That will change, but that is their current matrix. 3) 3-1 or 7-1 money exchange. None of this includes the subsidized energy that China gives to many of their companies.

Each iPod, sold in the US for $299, provides China with an export value of about $150, but as it turns out, Chinese producers really only 'earned' around $4 on each unit.

The differences in salary relative to cost of living ought to be taken into account. The average daily salary of a Chinese person is was around USD14.1 last year..

Secondly, it's not just about revenue but longer term industrial dependency. Were China to suddenly refuse (due to political embargo, for instance) to produce such items Apple would suffer a considerable economic loss, if only while they secured an alternative manufacturer. Chinese and Taiwanese companies are in a good position to steer the market in their favour, eventually producing (if not already) competing products for their own market - the world's biggest in many sectors - and others abroad.

are you sure there'd be much difference. The cost of Windows 7 in China is quite low at $60. I couldn't comment on how many Chinese will pirate it anyway.

I know this is just a project in its infancy, and given the recent intimacy of Uganda-Chinese relations, would a Googlebox built in by Chinese contractor be able to look up topics like Democracy or demonstration? Question Box has powerful potential; i wonder how vulnerable the box answers are to coercion, and whether deployment will be hindered by increasing foreign influence.

Don't get me wrong, the US is democratic and we shouldn't build more nuke plants if most people don't want them, even if I disagree with their reasons. But we could do something else, like offshore wind. In the long run, we can not longer equate a high living standard with burning lots of fossil fuels.

More links and pics about this guy:

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Sky-News-Archive/Article/200806413251033

http://www.china.org.cn/english/NM-e/96084.htm

http://rashmanly.wordpress.com/2008/11/27/wu-yulu-of-china-builds-his-own-wu-clang-clan-of-robot-sons/

Some semi-random quotes:

"[Wife] When we got married, everyone warned me he would care more about his robots than about me," she said, "but on the other hand, at least he doesn't drink or chase other women."

"So far, though, the farmer has encountered little success.

Five years ago, one of his inventions short-circuited, burning the family house to the ground.

Then in 2000 a salvaged battery exploded, leaving Mr Wu with serious burns on his hands and torso, requiring several weeks of hospital treatment.

Rebuilding the family home, paying his medical bills, and taking out extra loans to finance his new creations have left him staggering under almost £5,000 of debt. "

"Nor was that fire the first time his obsession hurt his loved ones. Wu grew up in a family where sometimes there was "no oil for cooking," Dong said. Once, the family scraped all its money together and bought him a remote-control car. He broke their hearts, she said, when he immediately took it apart to see how it worked."

""I got a rechargeable battery-like tube for a very low price from a recycling shop, thinking I could save money," Wu said. But he did not understand the English warning on the tube, and "when I tested the tube, it exploded in my hands. I remember a big fireball suddenly burst out, and I lost my memory." Luckily, neighbours rushed him to hospital. His memory returned, but the scars on his hands and arms and the pain he frequently feels in his wrists will last forever."

"Wu's perseverance finally began to pay off. Feature stories on the "farmer inventor" began appearing in various media. After one report on China Central Television (CCTV), its science channel hired Wu as a prop-maker, paying more than 3,000 yuan (US$375) a month. Each week he goes to CCTV for orders and makes them at home. Selling robot Wu Laowu helped speed the repayment of his loan."

Thus, it may not end so badly after all. Obsessed Geeks *can* break even. Maybe my SQL replacement language has a chance after all ;-)

BTW in theory the chinese citizens have votes too and can even stand for elections (in theory :) ).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_People's_Republic_of_China

http://www.china.org.cn/english/Political/26325.htm

They only have one party though.

They do have some form of accountability though. In the past few food scandals, the previous food safety chief was executed for corruption, and the current one has resigned.

It's not like they got USD20 million bucks for screwing up.

They most certainly don't execute people for corruption in my country.

As for censorship, the best form of mind control is to give citizens something else to think about.

I think most chinese citizens spend a fair bit of time thinking about getting rich (or at least richer).

I doubt the infamous MMORPG gold farmers would really care about Tibet, Tiananmen, Falun Gong etc, even if they knew about them.

As long as the money and food is satisfactory most people won't care.

Do the US citizens really care either? Bush was reelected, and his party still has a good chance.
The Two Parties have a far better chance than the other parties (which got less than 1% of the total votes in the prev elections).

For everyone's information ("CDMA doesn't have SIM cards!!11eleven!"), a recent development is the R-UIM card, which evidently can work as either a CDMA R-UIM card, or a GSM card. However, it seems that it is only for personal information, you can't just swap them out:
"*Enables users to program personal information once and roam between CDMA and GSM networks with a multimode device"
It seems that the RUIM card may work as a SIM card:
http://www.china.org.cn/english/BAT/109251.htm
Does anyone have any better info on this?

http://www.china.org.cn/english/entertainment/2166 22.htm Bones and skeletons have disappeared from the Chinese version of the popular on-line fantasy game, World of Warcraft (WoW), sparking fierce criticism from the nation's army of players. Chinese mainland gamers have waited half a year longer than their US counterparts for the upgraded version of the WoW, only to find the appearances of familiar skeletal characters have been fleshed out. The skeletons, regular characters, grow flesh in the new version and the bones symbolizing dead characters have been changed to graves. A staff member with the public relations department of The9, which runs WoW in China, was quoted by a Guangzhou-based newspaper Southern Metropolis Daily as saying the changes were made according to "China's particular situation and relevant regulations". "It's to promote a healthy and harmonious on-line environment," the anonymous staff said, according to the newspaper. However, Zhao Yurun, public relations director of The9, denied the explanation in an interview with Xinhua and said the changes were made as part of an "operational strategy". He said the company updated the game seven to eight times each year, adding patches that required no government approval to the original version. However, he said the changes in the latest version were the foundations for the first official expansion of WoW, "The Burning Crusade", which was awaiting approval by the State Press and Publication Administration (SPPA) and is expected to be released this summer. "We hope the expansion pack will successfully get the approval in acknowledgement of the self-discipline of our company," Zhao said. Wang Guoqing, director with the SPPA Video, Electronics and Internet Publication Management Department, said "The Burning Crusade" was still under expert consideration and she could make no comment till the final decision was released. The gamers thought the changes made the game dull and voiced their scorn on the official WoW website, filling more than ten pages with criticism. More than 500 gamers signed a post, announcing they would boycott the game. "Why should we accept the so-called 'good appearance' without the opportunity of being consulted?" wrote player "Cai Xu". "We don't need such harmony," wrote "Xue Linglong". Wang Cong, a journalist who has played the game for two years, said he would continue to play, but "I just think it's funny to make such meaningless changes". Zhao Yurun said the company had received no formal complaints from gamers, which should be delivered by letters or phone calls with the petitioners real names. The monster-killing game, first launched by California-based Blizzard Entertainment in 2004, is one of the most popular on-line role-playing games involving multiple players It has 8.5 million players worldwide, with more than 3.5 million in China. "The Burning Crusade" was released in other countries on January 16. The government has been urging Internet companies to clean up websites and offer only legal and "healthy" content. More than 100 news websites in China published a self-discipline regulation in May, pledging to purify the Internet environment. The websites vowed to standardize news collection, editing and publication, and eliminate false news and illegal information. They also promise to exclude pornographic and violent content from their websites. (Xinhua News Agency July 10, 2007)

1. I didn't bring up chinese sweatshops. The person I REPLIED TO brought them up. So you've directed your ire at the wrong post, bro. Go back and re-read the thread.

2. Are you actually suggesting that it's not the official position of Bejing that Taiwan is part of China? You don't have to be Taiwaneese to understand the very clear language they've used.

They claim Tibet is a part of China from 500 years ago (just like Saddam had a claim on Kuwait). Likewise, Taiwan has only existed for a few decades.

So they, whoever they is, claim that but in reality Tibet was ruled by the Dali Lama until Mao's Nationalist army invaded. Prior to this there was an agreement between the two country's, that China would defend Tibet from foreign agressors. Tibet was never a part of China before the invasion. Formosa, today called Taiwan, though has never had it's own independent governance. However the Formosan population is distictly different from Mainland China both culturally and genetically. China itself isn't even one megalithic nation, instead it's made of many different ethnic groups, from the Achang ethnic group to the Zhuang ethnic group. About the only thing that unites them is landmass and written language, though the Cantonese and Mandrin spoken languages are different they are the same when written.

1. Ne how
2. Ne how ma?

What are "Human Rights"?

The law defines intellectual property rights. If you don't like it talk to your representative.

Debunking of link #1 http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2004-01/27/con tent_301145.htm

This building had 4 floors added to it illegally. It ends with this quote:

Building collapses are common in Egypt and are often caused by shoddy construction or the unauthorized building of extra stories. The last such incident was May 4, when a seven-story apartment building collapsed in Cairo, killing at least seven people.

Debunking link #2 http://www.china.org.cn/english/2003/Nov/79742.htm

This is still under investigation. The cause of the collapse is not yet determined.

In both of these articles, the word steel is absent. How do you know they are of similar construction?

How is that for calling bullshit?

Steel frame building collapses: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2004-01/27/con tent_301145.htm http://www.china.org.cn/english/2003/Nov/79742.htm Can you find examples of "this type of steel frame building" with raging fires which didn't collapse? All of the examples of buildings which had fires but did not collapse that I've seen so far were instead concrete and steel frames.

You're wrong

http://www.china.org.cn/english/2004/Jun/97247.htm
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A0 DE3D71738F936A35754C0A960948260
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A0 DE6DA163FF930A35757C0A960948260
http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2003/07/23/st ory560336209.asp
http://www.americas.org/item_16224

Shut up now.

You're right that piracy - whether in terms of software, movies, etc. - abounds in China. Here is one cultural tidbit that might help explain why:

A very important value in Chinese culture is "saving face". No one wants to lose face, and no one wants to cause another person to lose face. For illustration, note that cheating in academic settings is also rampant in China. There is even a market for hired test-takers, who act as paid surrogates by taking exams in other peoples' names. Professors know about it; in fact professors tend to leave the testing room and just turn a blind eye to cheating. The article linked below comes from the Chinese media and is thus subject to government censoring, but you still get the idea:

http://www.china.org.cn/english/scitech/101379.htm

Now, if "saving face" is so important in China, why would the government enthusiastically crack down on piracy which, for the most part, hurts Western companies more than their domestic companies? From their perspective, they may be allowing people who practice piracy to save face. The chief reason remaining for the Communist party to discourage piracy is to appease Western nations. This does not seem to be a strong enough motivation for the government to go to *great* lengths to eliminate piracy, as long as they can show some progress to foreign nations.

It is clearly directed at nations, not at citizens in the US.

It, along with the PATRIOT Act and the entire "war on terror", are aimed at citizens in all nations, including the US. It is merely the next installment in a long-planned, carefully orchestrated, but poorly-executed scheme to exert pressure, in true imperialist fashion, on states and substates of the US to force "Western" (really Communist) values on the entire "civilized" world, including prohibitions of "hatred" (thought crimes), "extremist" religion (religions that actually read and follow their sacred texts), and "separatist" political movements (that threaten the global economy).

Your feigned shock at the idea of the terrorists "who fight back when attacked" is entirely appropriate since that isn't what is going on at all.

It absolutely is what's going on, for almost 50 years. You need a history lesson if you think otherwise.

They are fighting to establish a new Islamic super state with a literal theocracy.

Although I, and bin Laden himself, dispute your attribution of motives, many primarily Muslim countries in and around the middle east are in need of new leadership. The US thinks it should be them. Before they stopped taking land and started building borders, Israel thought it should be them. The UK would still like to have a say. Hell, Russia thinks it should be them. And, shock and awe, the actual Muslims living there think they should have a say. Everyone is surprised when the Muslims do get a say, and they elect a theocracy or a nationalist who keeps Arab oil for Arabs, instates a "gift economy" as Bush decries, and invests in profitable enterprises such as nuclear power.

Color me uninterested if I don't give a shit who it ends up being, as long as the US doesn't waste trillions of dollars or get further accused of being in league with those Zionist dipshits and create more brown people trying to blow themselves up in the US.

They are fundamentally (or is it fundamentalist?) imperialists.

They are not imperialist. They are nationalist. Empires are composed of priviledged classes colonising and ruling over occupied territories. Nations are composed of groups of people with a common race and/or language and/or religion.

Japan was imperialist. The UK was imperialist. The USSR was imperialist. Rome was imperialist. The US was, and still is, imperialist. China is primarily nationalist. Israel is nationalist, although it began as a colony in an occupied middle east, and still has its own occupied territories and underpriviledged classes. Nazi Germany was nationalist. The vast majority of Islamic republics in the middle east are nationalist.

Is this new to you?

No, it is not "news to me". I wrote a paper on the subject in October of 2001.

I hope you don't find that "poofy hair" make the "Dear Leader" cuddly. You seem to be presenting this as if to soften his image.

I do not and I was not. I think it makes him comical, in a supervillain sort of way. I added the phrase upon review because I felt some of my descriptions may not be clear enough. Obviously I should have added more to my description of bin Laden instead.

There were statements by government officials here in Hong Kong to that effect which is something that almost will never happen given the bias against chinese medicine here in Hong Kong at the governmental level.

see http://www.china.org.cn/english/scitech/68118.htm

Trumpeting?

see http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2003-06/12/conte nt_917113.htm

I live in Hong Kong and I know what I am talking about. I also personally know one Chinese medicine practitioner who was formerly a surgeon. He was in ER before he moved into Internal medicine and after all that, he chose chinese medicine. When he was still working in a hospital in China, his patients were all top brass and only a few 'lowly' ones ever got his service. He joined his wife here in Hong Kong which is the reason why he gave up his career in China.

BTW, chinese medicine does NOT cure illnesses. It only serves to adjust our immune system and our bodies do its work against whatever the pathogen is. That is where it excels over western medicine, which is mostly putting poisonous chemicals into our bodies or other destructive methods but some do become necessary, since it is rarely poisonous and even where it is a physical problem (tendons, slipped disks and so on) you will find superior 'traditional' pratices when compared to results you get from western medicines in all but the most extreme cases. This I can tell you from personal experience (except the most extreme case part but I guess we would all agree knee replacements and heart defects are beyond any non-surgical type of treatment).

[QUOTE]Electrical heating, electrical rail road engines, electrical cars would've made far more economic sense if electricity was as cheap and abundant as nuclear power can make it.[/QUOTE]

Even with the cheapest cents per watt hour, nuclear still isn't competitive with modern coal plants. You haven't offered anything that would suggest that we should be able to get cheap energy from nuclear (in the US).

[QUOTE]That's the point. Greenpeace's et al.'s passionate protests make the nuclear power's cost much higher financially. [/QUOTE]

While lawsuits from 'green' organizations make plant construction more costly (due to delays), I seriously doubt they are a significant factor.

[QUOTE]Even worse -- politically it was prohibitively expensive for decades.[/QUOTE]

They still recieved substantial government funding for research in reducing costs, etc. If it isn't economically cost effective, what does it matter the political costs?

[QUOTE]Now that Chinese (no more willing to depend on foreign fuel suppliers, than us) are about to build dozens of new nuclear plants (Toshiba's main motivation for this purchase), the world is suddenly reconsidering...[/QUOTE]

Chinas interest in nuclear is because for them coal has recently become increasingly more expensive and in short supply, whereas nuclear has had a steadily dropping price. If your coal is expensive then nuclear becomes much more attractive. If nuclear continues to drop in price it also becomes more attractive.

http://www.china.org.cn/english/BAT/124955.htm

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/030205_w orld_stories.shtml

[QUOTE]I wonder, then, why do Chinese plan to build dozens of nuclear plants by 2020? Do they know something, you don't?[/QUOTE]

No, they know something that you don't - namely that they are having difficulty meeting demand for their coal production needs, (see above) which is causing a steady and strong increase in coal prices. Also that the cost of nuclear power has been steadily decreasing. Given the huge projected energy demand that China faces, and the serious liklihood of being unable to meet demand with coal (and already they are close to maximum energy available for hydroelectric) limits them to nuclear energy.

Also a large portion of the initial capital outlay for building a nuclear powerplant is the labor required. Chinas labor costs are quite a bit cheaper than those of the US. Also as a government it is able to commission a large number of plants simultaneously giving a great deal of economy of scale.

Thus for China to try and meet a larger percentage of its energy needs by 2020 makes quite a bit of sense.

Also since China is a large exporter of coal as well as consumer they're reduced export capacity due to local consumption also drives up foreign prices. Leading to a knock on impact on price for other countries and thus an increased interest in nuclear.

For other countries such as the US that have large coal reserves, the greatly improved nuclear power plant designs that have come out over the past three years finally bring down the capital costs to where they are more reasonable. Of course the US has large reserves of coal with no threat of shortages - however there are not good reserves of low sulfur coal which is desirable to reduce acid rain (and while regular sulphur content coal can be processed to low sulphur it does increase the cost...).

LetterRip

If they do, it's only for one sentence...

http://www.china.org.cn/english/Political/26143.ht m

Nowhere does it say it is a Democracy. But it does say right up top:

I. Major stipulations in the Constitution in regard to China's political system

1. Major political principles in China

(1) The Communist Party of China is the country's sole political party in power.

(these are subpoints, the bottom one could be called I.1.(1) if you'd like).

One political party in power is not Democracy. So I think that China doesn't claim to be a Democracy.

There are multiple parties in Germany and France, so that makes them a heck of a lot more of a Democracy than China where other parties are not allowed.

Scarce means limited.

From the Webster : Not plentiful or abundant; in small quantity in proportion to the demand; not easily to be procured; rare; uncommon.

You do understand that a resource can be limited in absolute terms, yet abundant, I hope.

The US really is not protectionist against imports, I'm not sure why you are under this impression.

If you weren't your deficit would be even worse, even though your current government firmly believes that "deficit doesn't matter".

http://www.china.org.cn/english/BAT/82415.htm

Your whole post was a little odd as I was in no way saying all communications were only done by internet, and generally seemed to agree with every point I was making - indeed your pointing out so many other forms of communication exist only bolsters my point that China splitting off into its own internet would not be a huge deal as some are making it out to be.

However I think you are ignoring how widespread IP technology really is, for example in call centers - you said:

Again, an erroneous assumption that the Internet is necessary for outsourcing, and a change in its nature (or even its entire removal) will therefore close everything down. Do you actually know what the biggest single outsourcing industry in India is? Call centers. These have loads of people with telephones who answer calls from other people with telephones instead of using the line to send IP packets.

The reality is that all of those call centers are using VOIP on their end and it's all IP that's carrying that voice traffic to and from the US. There's no way call center outsourcing would be economically viable using traditional circuit-switched phone networks, not to mention that advanced features that VOIP allows enabling data to be sent with the call improving call duration (the all-important metric for most call centers).

Also, a few random things:

The first sensible thing you've said. However, what makes you think they'd bother tunneling to the US Internet,

It's not they tunneling to us, it's a company operating there tunneling back to here.

So people in the US want to have their property seized by corrupt politicos serving large corporate interests, and the DMCA, and a system that lets people patent farting, and copyrights than never expire, and all those other things that Americans regularly bitch about on Slashdot?

Of those things ONLY eminent domain has enjoyed a popular backlash. And you know what is happening there? A myriad of local state laws to prevent abuse. Just as I said, if people REALLY do not like something they will fight it. Which is why growing abuses of the DMCA are to be desired because only when a significant portion of people grow mad enough will things change. The EFF has done a remarkable job as-is blocking things like the broadcast flag when it's not even a blip on the public radar.

You really have no idea how the IOL selects Olympic venues, do you?

Well that point is irrelevant since they have already been selected. If I were more flippant I would make some comment about how while you may know more about what the committee does you've not paid attention to what they've done.

Political backlash from other countries (especially the U.S.) could be enough to derail the selection of China as host country though, if they start seeming overly militaristic.

"The satellite is to be launched into lunar orbit for comprehensively probing into rich resources on the moon such as He3, Fe, Ti and water-ice, as well as its surface condition, landforms, geologic structure and physical fields through remote sensing. "

Later that article mentions the three step goals as:
"Another two deputy chief designers of Shenzhou III spacecraft revealed a three-step plan of China's first manned spaceflight:
[1] Take Chinese astronauts into space;
[2] create a space laboratory;
[3] and establish China's space station and establish a connection with international space stations. "

Looks like the Moon base and telescope were recent additions to the three step plan. In November 8, 2003 the Xinhua News Agency reported these four goals for Moon program:
" For the first goal, there will be three-dimensioned graphs of the lunar surface.
Basic structures and physiognomy units of the lunar surface will be defined precisely. Researches on the shape, size, distribution, and density will be made on the crates on the moon. These researches on the crates will produce data for identifying the age of the surface and early history of terrestrial planets and provide information needed to select the sites selecting for soft landing on the moon surface and for the lunar base.

The second goal is concentrating on the distribution and types of elements.
It will be focused on the content and distribution of 14 elements such as titanium and iron which can be exploited. A map of elements distribution around the moon will be sketched. Graphs for lunar rocks, mineral materials and geology will also be drawn respectively. The area rich in specific elements will be identified. And prospects of the development and exploitation of the mineral resources will be evaluated.

The third goal is to detect the depth of the lunar soil through microwave radiation.
In this way we can calculate the age of the lunar surface and distribution of the lunar soil on the lunar surface. This lays a foundation for the further estimates of the content, distribution, and quantity of helium-3 which is power generating fuel caused by nuclear fusion.

The fourth goal is focused on the space environment between the earth and the moon.
The average distance between the earth and the moon is 380 million km, which is in the earth's far magnetotail. Here the satellite probes solar energetic particles, plasma in solar wind, and the interaction between the solar wind and the moon and between the tail of the magnetic field of the earth and the moon. " Then of course we have to look at Chinanews 2005-11-01 article that sums up the most recent plans: "China will consider manned lunar landing after 2017". ...
" As for when the first Chinese astronaut will set foot on the moon, Ouyang said China will be capable of realizing manned lunar landing between 2020 and 2025. After that, China will also plan to build a base on the moon. "

BTW - China *does* have plans to go to the moon and establish a base there. From the horse's mouth, this is site referring to a Chinese white paper outlining their plans for lunar exploration.

The Chinese are certainly interested in putting men on the moon, however, as is JAXA.

The ESA , on the other hand, is looking to go directly to Mars.

We could do this in a short time frame again, but the projects that we're competing against, namely the Chinese, Japanese, and European, are all operating under longer timescales, making ours the most likely to finish first. Also, the current Lunar exploration budget has been designed to require very little in the way of extra funding. They're cutting out other programs that cost losts of money (read Space Shuttle, ISS, and some exploration missions), but the overall budget is very similar.

For these two reasons, it seems liekly that this will actually work, and that we will land men on the moon again in the very near future.

It has a few things that Google doesn't have and probably never could have. The first is a multimedia search engine which links directly to online rips of copyrighted materials. Any Joe Chan over in China wanting to download something like the latest Britney Spears album can hop on Baidu and grab any which link they find. Google, being an American company would be hard pressed to do something as outrageous as that which would no doubt incur the wrath of the RIAA and MPAA,

China has new copyright laws and has acted as if they are going to enforce them. Don't expect this sort of feature to last for long on Baidu. The link is to a Chinese article, so it could be filled with propaganda, but they are acting this way to favor western companies. If the AA's make enough noise, Baidu will fall in line too.

I noticed you never backed up YOUR claims against GWB nor denied mine against Bill Clinton. Tell ya what, name me one U.S. Multinational that owns lots of Chinese Production capacity? US Mutlinationals want TARRIFS on Chinese goods. Here are some FACTS from http://www.china.org.cn/english/25298.htm: "Actual foreign direct investment(FDI) in China reached a new high at US$46.85 billion last year, as investors build up confidence in the market following its accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), according to latest statistics released by the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation (MOFTEC)." Note that this is ALL Foreign Investment not "US Mutlinationals". 46.9B is a drop in the bucket, and it's only able to be invested in areas where the Chinese Government wants it to be, and often with rules and kickbacks to the Communists. Read the issue of Fortune magazine about 6 weeks ago that talks about Wal-Mart's investment in China and how the Government wants it but then they setup Government backed competition to undercut even Wal-Mart's prices. YOU are the leftwing nut, I may be conservative but I back things up with FACTS, not liberal Bullshit talking points.

China's government says its economy is only growing at 5%. In reality it's growing at 10%.

They say they won't finish the olympic stadium until 2008. It's finished now.

They say 3 gorges won't become operational until 2010. It's operational now.

Bill Gates knows they will say this because he (if I may cut you off here) is trying to get whatever profit he can from the country while those evil Communist psychos still let them operate in China in the first place. After all, what semi-sane company wants to disrespect a belligerent, nuke-brandishing government who wants to blow up their corporate country of origin, nevermind extinguish all free speech in their own spaces?

Ok, all these experts say we'll run out of fossil fuels in about 50 years at our current consumption.

Uh, you *do* realize that the "greying" you speak of mostly will occur in the U.S. and Europe (due to the baby boom created shortly after World War II), not in the rest of the world, right?

Besides, India has over 1 billion people. IIRC, only some fraction of 1% of them are actually employed in IT (for now). China has 1.2 billion people, and is in a similar situation.

In 1991, only 285 million of their then about 0.9 billion people were actually "economically active". Assuming the rate has remained approximately the same with India's growth, then about 316 million people now are "economically active" there. That only leaves, oh, about 700 million people as unproductive labor, waiting to be educated and put to work in IT (or engineering, or other fields)...

China has about 740 million of their 1.2 billion employed (assuming China isn't lying about these statistics). So there's another 500 million then in China who could be tapped for IT work, given the training and education (and that's ignoring the people they already employ in IT).

And then there's Russia, Belgium, the former Soviet-bloc eastern European nations, South Korea, etc. etc., which I haven't touched-upon... Believe me, there are *PLENTY* of people in other nations to fill whatever labor demands American businesses may have.

In short, for practical purposes, there is no "greying" you speak of, once you include the labor supplies of the world economy, not just the U.S. economy. Think globally, not locally.

I call BULLSHIT.

Just thought I'd ask.