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2/3 of China is below the poverty line

You can be forgiven for thinking that, because it was not that long ago what you say was true and you don't get a lot of news about China in the mainstream press.

But these days the poverty rate has been driven to 3.1 percent, because China has been working really hard to live the very poorest out of poverty.

Now China is of course known to cook some books, but even with that factored in they are far from having 2/3 of China below the poverty line these days.

It's not a matter of cooking books but cooking definitions. The poverty level often used for such breathtaking advancements in Chinese poverty eradication is an income of less than $2/day. Yes, earning around $500-600 per year is considered above the poverty level. This particular definition allows the China government to aim "to eliminate absolute poverty by 2020".

Are you considering poverty strictly on daily gross income without taking into account regional costs of living?

Word of advice: don't.

Bro, you forgot to factor in regional costs of living. In some areas $2/day is enough to live well out of poverty.

It's the same in every country, even here in the US. A single person making $30K/year would be one cunt-hair close to living in the gutter in, say, San Francisco or Miami.

That same gross income would make the same person live well above the poverty line in Sebring, FL.

2/3 of China is below the poverty line

You can be forgiven for thinking that, because it was not that long ago what you say was true and you don't get a lot of news about China in the mainstream press.

But these days the poverty rate has been driven to 3.1 percent, because China has been working really hard to live the very poorest out of poverty.

Now China is of course known to cook some books, but even with that factored in they are far from having 2/3 of China below the poverty line these days.

It's not a matter of cooking books but cooking definitions. The poverty level often used for such breathtaking advancements in Chinese poverty eradication is an income of less than $2/day. Yes, earning around $500-600 per year is considered above the poverty level. This particular definition allows the China government to aim "to eliminate absolute poverty by 2020".

Couldn't you manufacture cheaply in Vietnam, Bangladesh or Africa, or Latin America as well?

1. all these countries also violate intellectual properties left and right. All developing countries, including the USA itself, violate intellectual propertiesen mass during the early days of its industrialization. (And they will all become patent trolls once they become developed.)
2. like the US, China has entered an era post low-end manufacturing and therefore boost its intellectual property protection as a way to move up the economic food chain. This is the real reason the US is so afraid of China now: once China plays the same IP games, the US will lose its competitive advantages.
3. many of those other countries, including those "democratic" ones, are more corrupted than the "communist" China.

You don't hear much about IP violations, or corruption, or human rights violation in those other countries or the US itself simply because China is currently the main arch-rival of the US and the West world.

The first Gen IV pebble bed reactor was installed at the Huaneng Shidao Bay nuclear power plant last year. Here is a slide show of it being installed.

I'll note two things. First, it's a future plan not a present action. Second, where's the evidence that they actually are planning to move away from oil? None of the "focus areas" or "policies" are petroleum related.

The accompanying "infographic" similarly mentions no such plan. The only thing even close is point #16 which proposes to promote use of electric vehicles and increase the industrialization of same.

"Taikonaut" isn't a portmanteau. The suffix -naut comes from the Greek word for "sailor". We call our space men "astronauts" and Russians call theirs "cosmonauts", both essentially meaning "space sailors". It may be strange to mix a Chinese word ("taikong") with a Greek suffix ("-naut"), but we didn't create it.

Rumor has it the word was invented in Malaysia, but Americans probably use it because of sources like Xinhua. Here's an example of them using it in 2008:

Taikonaut Zhai's small step historical leap for China

dom

...The law establishes basic principles for counter-terrorism work and strengthens measures of prevention, handling, punishment as well as international cooperation, he said.

Under the new bill, telecom operators and internet service providers are required to provide technical support and assistance, including decryption, to police and national security authorities in prevention and investigation of terrorist activities.

They should also prevent dissemination of information on terrorism and extremism.

Li Shouwei of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee legislative affairs commission, said the rule accorded with the actual work needed to fight terrorism and was basically the same as other major countries.

"The clause reflects lessons China has learned from other countries and is a result of wide solicitation of public opinion," he added.

"(It) will not affect companies' normal business nor install backdoors to infringe intellectual property rights, or ... citizens freedom of speech on the internet and their religious freedom," Li said.

China's national security law adopted in July also requires Internet and information technology, infrastructure, information systems and data in key sectors to be "secure and controllable"....

Ah, yes... darned those people trying to save fellow Australians from the 10 year drought with water rations and water reserves at less than 30% with no sign of the drought ending. You do realize if it had been a 15 year drought instead of a 10 year drought, you'd be praising that facility as a godsend, right?

The cost per day is even higher than you state, but to be fair -- the payments are mostly on the construction of the facility -- not actually the cost of maintaining the idle facility. It'll take nearly 30 years to pay it off, but after that, hey... you have a great facility should you need it... and you probably will.

With reservoirs at 80%, you've less than 1 1/2 years of water stored (assuming no rainfall at all). You're set for the next 10 year drought or longer, but go ahead and whine about the cost while you're not using it so I can tell you I told you so when you're living off of the water it makes during an upcoming 20 year drought.

Geez, you're like the guy that complains about the cost of buying a generator he never uses -- 'til a hurricane knocks out the power for a week or two.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/engl...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

They literally have whole cities just lying around idle. I mean, Spain's got one, sure, but they have several. The economy never developed sufficiently to employ people in jobs that would permit them to live in developed cities in a capitalist society... so the places rot.

You are quoting gloating "China is fallin - see?" populist Daily Mail-grade articles which have little to no relevance to reality.

I.e. OMG LOOK AT THIS GHOST CITY! Silly Chinese peoples. Don't they know any thing? Their stupid, stupid brains.

Meanwhile, in reality...
It's a case of combined schadenfreude over someone's perceived failure and a situation akin to when a small turnip farmer from Lower Bumfuck comes to a BigCityTM and starts despairing at the sight of a construction yard which will surely fail cause there is no chance that 50-storey building could ever be filled with people.
He could have planted turnips there.

Ordos is actually an entire prefecture. Slightly bigger than South Carolina or Austria (86,752 km2).
Population: ~1.9 million.
Urban population: ~582,544, living in the Dongsheng District.
That region has 16% of all coal reserves in China. And a 2nd highest income-per-capita in China.
It has a textile, petrochemical, car, electricity generating and a building industry - all built on the back of all that coal.
And they are using it to rapidly urbanize the prefecture - pooling all those 1.9 million people in one place.
http://www.theatlantic.com/chi...
http://www.vagabondjourney.com...
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes...

China is urbanizing RAPIDLY. At the rate of about 1% per year.
How much is 1% out of 1.35 billion people, yearly? About an entire Los Angeles of people looking for home, food, work, running water, electricity... and generally better living conditions than back in their village.
Year after year after year...

So, China is building entire cities from scratch and half coaxing half forcing people to move there.
Not just dropping apartment buildings or giant towers and sand islands that "someone will surely buy into" either.
Those are planned cities with built-in infrastructure (including all those "empty" parks and highways) to support hundreds of thousands of people with tens of thousands pouring yearly into Ordos alone, on a 20-year urbanization plan.
Many of those people coming in quite literally from the fields.

I asked the men where they had lived before moving to their apartments in Kangbashi. One of them, a 56-year-old man named Li Yonh Xiang, spoke up. "I lived here," he said.

Li had been born and raised just steps from the bench where he was sitting. About half of the 90-acre park had belonged to his family; the government bought the land in 2000. "When we were peasants, we lived according to the weather," Li said. "Now I live in a heated building with six floors. The city is very nice. There are many cars and buildings, but the air is very clean."

By stick and by carrot both.
http://europe.chinadaily.com.c...

China's urbanization program has been forced into motion by a fiscal policy that all but demands local cities expand to remain economically solvent. According to the World Bank, China's cities must fend for 80 percent of their expenses while only receiving 40 percent of the country's tax revenue, so land sales are often used to make up the difference.

Land is bought by cit

Interestingly, despite the US blocking international cooperation on the International Space Station, China is welcoming International involvement on the Chinese Space Station.

• China's space station to open for foreign peers
• China's space station to welcome international scientists

Reminds me of baseball's World Cup. And 1984 (ie doublepeak)

Interestingly, despite the US blocking international cooperation on the International Space Station, China is welcoming International involvement on the Chinese Space Station.

• China's space station to open for foreign peers
• China's space station to welcome international scientists

Reminds me of baseball's World Cup. And 1984 (ie doublepeak)

"Please, get the CNN polls and stuff them deep into your rectum. They are worth just that."

Why, because they're inconvenient for your pro-Putin lies? What about the City.am one which stems from a neutral Ukrainian polling outfit before it all kicked off? I guess that was so inconvenient you couldn't even address it?

"Here's a video of locals stopping a tank: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... Here is an iconic picture of Putin's agent provocateurs blocking a railroad crossing to stop Ukrainian tanks: http://www.rbc.ua/rus/news/acc... and another one http://crisisua.net/zhiteli-sl."

You know that repeating yourself doesn't make something true right? As I said, hundreds, some of whom are legit, but others who are agent provocateurs does not equate to popular support.

The fact you're persisting in arguing that numbers in the hundreds, or thousands in a specific circumstance in a specific place controlled by Russian's is somehow representative of the millions whilst also claiming polls that are objective and more representative are useless tells us one thing - you're not arguing based on rationality, you're arguing based on an agenda, a pro-Russian, pro-Putin one.

"I was personally in Kramatorsk helping to move my friend's family from there during the start of the conflict. And I certainly know that the reason for the conflict was not Putin."

I was there yesterday and everyone told me they hate Putin and it's all his fault. Last night on the phone Putin even told me it's his fault. See how that works?

"And? Mariupol is fairly far from Donetsk, and after one month or brainwashing by the Ukrainian media,"

So what was the excuse last time the Ukrainians liberated Mariupol because the populace helped kick the Russian's out? That was over a month ago, or is that also too much of an inconvenient truth for you? Why is it a problem if Ukraine blocks Russia today after months of pro-Russian propaganda but the fact that Russia only allows pro-Moscow propaganda? You only think it's bad when Moscow is at the receiving end of censorship? What you said about Ukraine having no opposition TV/Radio, that's false, what they don't have is Russia's propaganda outlet, RT, that's not the same as no opposition voice.

"Incidentally, if we're talking about the people digging trenches: http://gordonua.com/news/war/P... then it turned out to be a photo-op, staged by Ukrainian media."

Wow, who'd have thought it? Russian media outlet claims Ukrainian trench digging is photo op! Let's try a more neutral source that's historically aligned with Russia shall we, I suppose the Chinese are supporting Western propaganda too right? - http://news.xinhuanet.com/engl...

I think you need to stop swallowing Putin's propaganda, it's not good for you, you're siding with anecdotes and propaganda over polls and objective sources.

Ask the cities that have transport tunnels why they haven't built any more.

Incomplete list of cities surprised to learn that they are not building new transportation tunnels right now:

New York
London
Delhi
Toronto
Beijing (multiple lines)
San Francisco
Los Angeles (just getting started)
Paris (multiple lines)
Seoul (including a maglev line)
...and so on. Those are just the ones I'm immediately aware of.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/engl...

Sorry, I should have expounded a little more. I read the article and the discussion here intending to ask the same question that ericlowe did. I answered much too concisely after I looked up the definition, so I skipped some of the thought process.
I didn't mean to imply that it was successful, only that the machine deployed from its lander. I suppose that I would have been more complete had I said that it had deployed properly up to "x" point, then failed at "y." (In the example that dictionary.com provided, even if the landing gear of a plane deploys properly, it doesn't necessarily follow that it will "accomplish its mission" and land safely.)

Well, in fact one of the commenters in this article linked to a set of much nicer pictures

At least one of those photos is a fake. Well, not fake, but not the Hynix plant burning. The best photo is actually a picture of Beijing's CCTV headquarters burning in 2009. http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-02/09/content_10790640.htm

Tell me about the uproar that must have erupted from North of the Huai River when it was announced that the lack of environmental compliance has reduced life expectancy on average by five years in the northern half of China. Show me the state sponsored news source that ran that story.

Here's the official xinhua news story: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-07/11/c_132533452.htm

And the same in chinese for comparison: http://news.xinhuanet.com/fortune/2013-07/12/c_124997416.htm

Go ahead, compare that article with with this one. The latter makes it sound like it was second hand smoke as the primary source of limited life spans. It's like reading two completely different health reports!

You sure got that right, the xinhua story you linked is based on a different report, different researchers and all...

Solve your censorship problem and you will solve a lot of your other problems. Just be prepared to see high turnover in your leadership -- something that has been needed for a very long time in China.

Never pass up a chance to bash China, spoken like a true sockpuppet...

Tell me about the uproar that must have erupted from North of the Huai River when it was announced that the lack of environmental compliance has reduced life expectancy on average by five years in the northern half of China. Show me the state sponsored news source that ran that story.

Here's the official xinhua news story: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-07/11/c_132533452.htm

And the same in chinese for comparison: http://news.xinhuanet.com/fortune/2013-07/12/c_124997416.htm

Go ahead, compare that article with with this one. The latter makes it sound like it was second hand smoke as the primary source of limited life spans. It's like reading two completely different health reports!

You sure got that right, the xinhua story you linked is based on a different report, different researchers and all...

Solve your censorship problem and you will solve a lot of your other problems. Just be prepared to see high turnover in your leadership -- something that has been needed for a very long time in China.

Never pass up a chance to bash China, spoken like a true sockpuppet...

Tell me about the uproar that must have erupted from North of the Huai River when it was announced that the lack of environmental compliance has reduced life expectancy on average by five years in the northern half of China. Show me the state sponsored news source that ran that story.

Here's the official xinhua news story: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-07/11/c_132533452.htm

And the same in chinese for comparison: http://news.xinhuanet.com/fortune/2013-07/12/c_124997416.htm

Go ahead, compare that article with with this one. The latter makes it sound like it was second hand smoke as the primary source of limited life spans. It's like reading two completely different health reports!

You sure got that right, the xinhua story you linked is based on a different report, different researchers and all...

Solve your censorship problem and you will solve a lot of your other problems. Just be prepared to see high turnover in your leadership -- something that has been needed for a very long time in China.

Never pass up a chance to bash China, spoken like a true sockpuppet...

What are your list of the other three most embarrassing departments in our world?

Surely the Environmental Ministry cannot be as harmful as the Chinese Ministry preventing this quote from being carried in Xinhua, China Daily or any major news source in China?

Tell me about the uproar that must have erupted from North of the Huai River when it was announced that the lack of environmental compliance has reduced life expectancy on average by five years in the northern half of China. Show me the state sponsored news source that ran that story. Go ahead, compare that article with with this one. The latter makes it sound like it was second hand smoke as the primary source of limited life spans. It's like reading two completely different health reports!

Solve your censorship problem and you will solve a lot of your other problems. Just be prepared to see high turnover in your leadership -- something that has been needed for a very long time in China.

It's not so stark a contrast when you consider how cheap it is to travel by plane inside the US. My friends and relatives in China are surprised at how inexpensive a plane ticket is here.

Consider the reported lowest priced Economy class seats on the new Beijing-Guangzhou (around 2000km) high speed line is RMB 895, and that Beijing's and Guanzhou's average wages are around RMB 60k, that means the cost of a one-way trip is around 1.5% of yearly income. Now, the lowest cost of a similar one-way flight in the US, New York-New Orleans (2100km), is $250 on expedia, and factor in the US average wage of $42k, we get 0.6% of yearly income, or around 1/3 the relative cost vs traveling by high speed rail in China.

Looking at this from another angle, a typical "slow" train (100km-120km/hr) ticket from Beijing to Guanzhou is around RMB 250 (overnight, arriving 2nd day), and we see that this is the train equivalent of the Concorde -- meant for small business travelers and well-off tourists. Of course, I assume most businesses would likely just pay the RMB 1700 plane ticket to get to the meeting on time. When you consider all that, there's still a lot left to improve in the transportation infrastructure, and a long time to wait for prices to come down. Americans still have it better in terms of availability, inexpensiveness, and speed. One positive, though, no TSA pat downs in China.

You can't keep a secret in this country. Not for months. Certainly not for years. Not from other countries..

If there was any truth to the Mayan End of the World, other governments, or Wikileaks would be all over it.
The same would be true of faked moon landings.
There are lots of countries which would love to catch the US in a big lie.

I get it from the article about their first long distance flight. They flew mostly during the day. Notice the flight was May to July during the longer days of the year. They also spent a significant time gaining altitude using thermals and local lift conditions to conserve battery power. Evidence if this is quote from the Africa trip article.

On its final leg from Toulouse to Payerne, Solar Impulse traveled 615 km (382 miles) in 13 hours 29 minutes at an average speed of 63 km/h (39 mph) and at an average altitude of 3,596 meters (11,800 ft).

If the average speed was 63 km/h and it flew for 13.5 hours it should have gone 850km. Since the distance is only 615 km, where did the other 235 km go? That is almost 28% of the movement. They went to spiraling in thermals and searching for other form of lift to conserve power. It's real average speed if measured as progress toward its destination is closer to 45 km/h.It's real average speed if measured as progress toward its destination is closer to 45 km/h.

Take a look at the sailplane distance record. That pilot went faster and much further with no motor at all. Sorry but Solar Impulse is not an electric powered aircraft. It is a high performance sailplane with a very expensive electric motor to help it get from lift condition to lift condition.

Ok.. so I went to the article and saw the link to the Chinese site with the pics... http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/photo/2012-12/16/c_132043872_6.htm

All I can say is WTF... while the picture of the asteroid is interesting. There's a dozen photo galleries below it with photos that I would NOT want to be shared with friends and family...

For example... an "Underwear Show" "Top Bikini babes..." "Contortionist..."

Time to find another site without the BS...

A electric, solar no less, plane traveling around the globe nonstop will be a fantastic achievement!

Agreed, the point is that these people have not even flown 15 hours nonstop. Notice that they keep referring to 20 hour legs with two pilots? Add that to the fact that it is a single pilot aircraft means that they land at least once a leg. They have also never flown across a large body of water. Saying that this technology will make a nonstop flight around the world is like showing a dragster and saying it can be used to get from LA to New York really fast.

The main obstacle is that there is very little, if any, lift over oceans. Lift is caused by differences in the land surface, materials, mountains etc. There are no stable differences on the ocean surface and therefore no lift.
The circumference of the earth is about 2200km. Divide that by the 45km/h speed and you get 19 days. That is a lot of supplies including oxygen, which will be needed above 10000ft, to be carried on a light sailplane. Noter they flew at an average of 11,800 ft on their first trek.

Another point is that sailplanes already do better than this aircraft under similar conditions. This pilot already went three times the distance of one of their legs in a sailplane with no motor at all.

They have a long way to go before any of their long distance goals will be reached.

If you compare this image with the Goldstone image of Toutatis by Earth-based radar - see Figure 1 in Hudson et al - you can see that the Earth radar does OK, but actually going there is better. Toutatis's rotation period is 176 hours, so we won't get to see the other side in the flyby.

Note that there are a few craters, but not many (asteroid Itokawa has no craters in Hayabusa images), so as usual something is resurfacing the surface.

Try clicking the buttons below the cartoon.

Here's a link to a news article showing them three waving from the Tiangong-1 spacelab:

http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/special/shenzhou9/index.htm

(a bit surprised the Slashdot article was refering to a Houston newspaper not Xinhua net).

Saudi Arabia is only "friendly" if you are an oil company.

Then I guess America is the biggest fucking oil company in the world.

wow, links to US and British sites, how trustworthy. Meanwhile real people who have been to DPRK report a completely different situation. Like tourists or exchange students, they are even some blogs on the net, stop being a pathetic brainwashed tool and educate yourself.

Just don't wander off the beaten path:
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-07/12/content_8536078.htm

PYONGYANG, July 12 (Xinhua) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) regrets the death of a South Korean tourist killed by a DPRK soldier but the woman should take full responsibility for the incident, a DPRK spokesman said Saturday.

South Korean government should take full responsibilities, make an apology to the DPRK and promise that a similar incident would never happen again, said the spokesman for the DPRK Guidance Bureau for Comprehensive Development of Scenic Spots.

I even linked to a mainland China news source instead. Happy?

Minimum wage in Shenzhen is 1500 RMB per month, or about $1.20 per hour. In terms of purchase power, it's about the same as $9/hour in the US.

Sadly, I have to agree that the issue you raise is a big potential problem (especially that those with power and wealth often use that first and foremost to preserve their relative privilege), and it is very much what the USA is already struggling through. For example, real wages have been essentially flat in the USA for the past thirty to forty years, while productivity has doubled or tripled and the money has gone to the workers not as wages but as loans:
http://www.capitalismhitsthefan.com/

Things may well get much worse before they get better, before people (OWS etc.) eventually confront "the mythology of wealth":
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/?q=node/402
"In fact, the cheap-labor conservatives have counter-attacked with their own “rational” theory to justify their hierarchical world-view. Some call it “Social Darwinism”, though more politically savvy cheap-labor conservatives avoid that term. The purpose of this “rational theory” is to establish that the existing social order is the “natural order”. Elites enjoy wealth, privilege and status because of their inherent superiority. The place where this natural hierarchy is established, is that mythical place known as the “market”."

And:
"The Market as God"
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1999/03/the-market-as-god/6397/

Marshall Brain talks about that general issue here:
http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-freedom.htm
"With the rank and file employees gone, all of the money in the corporation flows upward to the executives and shareholders. The concentration of wealth will accelerate dramatically because robots allow real automation in the service sector for the first time in history. The amount of money paid to executives and shareholders will be remarkable. Meanwhile, the one million displaced employees will flow into a job market that is flooded by robotically-displaced workers. Since all major corporations with large numbers of employees will be doing the same thing, it is difficult to imagine the economy suddenly creating enough jobs to absorb all of the displaced workers. If the economy does not create new jobs for them, they will be living in government welfare dormitories. "

And also in his story "Manna":
http://www.marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm

This is starting to happen even in China. See, for example:
"Foxconn to replace workers with 1 million robots in 3 years"
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-07/30/c_131018764.htm
"Foxconn, the world's largest maker of computer components which assembles products for Apple, Sony and Nokia, is in the spotlight after a string of suicides of workers at its massive Chinese plants, which some blamed on tough working conditions."

Or from a couple years ago:
http://www.plasticsnews.com/china/english/headlines2.html?id=1278958338
"In the wake of labor unrest, Chinese factories are adding automation to control rising labor costs. It was bound to happen. China, once considered one of the lowest-cost automotive producers because of its supply of cheap labor, is becoming another example of rising expectations as workers demand their share of the country's growing industrial prosperity. The rash of strikes at Honda and Toyota parts factories and assembly plants in southern China this year -- with demands for substantially higher wages at the Japanese-owned companies

Shenzhen sold apple the international trademark to "iPad" back in 2006. That's what is up for grabs here.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/video/2011-12/09/c_131297760.htm

Plus never mind they have no product named, "iPad" either.

I could name dozens of companies that are more hated in this world than apple. Xe, Halliburton, BP, News Corp, etc.

Just because you don't like them doesn't mean that it's universal.

how about a probe of US oil rigging?

Or, even better, a US probe of China oil rigging in the “West Philippine Sea"? ;)

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/indepth/2011-11/21/c_131259724.htm

'A couple of months ago, Prof. Lyle Goldstein painted a doleful picture in the Foreign Policy magazine. He said if U.S. leaders heed his advice, they should shed most commitments in Southeast Asia, which he portrays as a region of trivial importance situated adjacent to an increasingly powerful China. He maintained that "Southeast Asia matters not a whit in the global balance of power."'

No worries, coal seam fires like this one : http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-11/21/content_7120136.htm , some of which have been burning for decades should keep Dear Old Mother Urth toasty warm.

or [the US could] compete on quality like the Germans

Does that mean the US will get to impose hundreds of anti-dumping duties on Chinese imports like Germany?

EU extends China anti-dumping duty for barium carbonate
EU levies stiff anti-dumping tariffs [on ceramic tiles]
Chinese exporters regret EU anti-dumping duties on Chinese-made screws, bolts
Germany's SolarWorld expects anti-dumping complaints vs China
EU Hits China with Anti-Dumping Duties on Paper
EU greenlights anti-dumping duties on Chinese light bulbs
EU Extended Anti-Dumping Duties on Chinese Bicycle Imports

You see, while German manufacturers and workers are busy competing 'on quality', as you say, the German government is actively protecting domestic industry from competition with China throughout the EU. German manufacturers and German workers do not have to compete with disposable Asian workers and indifferent health/safety/labor/environmental regulation.

The 'oh-noes trade war' sentiment that we get from pro-business types and Chinese ministers is a farce. We're in a trade war. We're getting our clocks cleaned. That is the real reason we have thousands of 'business' degree graduates in their late 20s shuffling around trying to 'occupy' Wall Street. The US no longer provides the real growth necessary to accommodate them. They are surplus people; their futures went to China.

There was no direct evidence that Google was functioning as a pawn in US foreign policy regarding China, but that didn't stop Xinhua from alluding to the allegations (that came from their political superiors).
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/sci/2010-01/24/c_13148771.htm
Maybe Xinhua isn't the best source for a neutral perspective.

some updates on the incident, if you guys care to know. sources are in chinese.

a train rider confirmed that operator of the second train apparently did his best to brake the train manually. (source: http://roll.sohu.com/20110724/n314348071.shtml). according to a microblog, the operator was found in the badly deformed cockpit, impaled by the brake lever. (source: http://weibo.com/michaelwangsg)

from official xinhua news: another train, D3212 was struck by lightning a mere 5km away from the derail site under discussion here (the two trains involved are d3115/d301). d3212 lost power and stopped, too.

source: http://news.xinhuanet.com/society/2011-07/24/c_121711520.htm

Now that lawsuit brought against Google for use of the name Nexus doesn't seem so frivolous. http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2010-01/07/content_12772459.htm

You mean... *gasp* that a common english word with a pretty generic meaning might actually get used in something important?

Seriously. Grow up.

Legislating physics doesn't work. California was supposed to have a 100% emissions free new vehicle fleet eleven years ago. Maybe obviating ~20% of all US base load power generation is possible without getting voted out of office for a generation. Good luck with that.

Nuclear power isn't dead. It isn't even dying. China made obligatory noises about 'reviewing' nuclear projects after Fukushima Construction has not actually halted and nothing has been canceled. Ultimately it will amount to a couple siting changes and little else. Sweden is pushing back at German nuclear energy policy changes and has no intention of abandoning its own nuclear energy. Neither will France.

Germany is the victim of a large amount Chernobyl fallout, so nuclear is a bad word in German politics. Germany's neighbors, on the other hand, are not uniformly following Germany's lead. It is rather likely that Germany will find itself replacing some of its lost generation capacity with foreign nuclear power.

As for the US? Investors are not going to put up billions of dollars for pressure groups to play with in court for twenty years; that money is going to China. Nothing is going to happen one why or the other until after the currency collapse and breakup. We're a debtor nation balkanized around our welfare state, so we don't get to build, replace or otherwise change much of anything until long after the public debt bubble pops.

The power generation system you have now will be what you have in 2026. If you're lucky.

It's not 6%... http://www.usdebtclock.org/ Quotes US national debt at ~14 trillion. China holds ~3 trillion in US bonds. That is ~21% of our national debt. Citation:http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-04/23/c_13842843.htm Also, bonds aren't the only form of obligations the US sells to cover its debts. I think its safe to assume China likely owns a larger chunk of US debt than the bonds alone. In a world of nuclear weapons, economic domination is king. You may also want to look at the alliances China is trying to form with the many enemies (or barely neutral parties) the US has acquired over the years. Most recently that includes Afghanistan, though this is a work in progress. tl;dr China owns roughly 21% of US national debt through bonds alone.

Close up photo of the curved yellow cement on the large pipes.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/photo/2011-04/16/c_13832377_4.htm

I think this piece of cement is from the primary containment of unit #3. This low angle shot shows it is heavily reinforced. Remember the diameter of the pipes it is sitting on is about 10-12 feet each.

It's a little late to be vindicated, but I am posting this to complete the record. Today April 17 more photos are released. It is much better than the earlier photos. The photos very clearly show scattered fuel rods that are not in a pool or core. After they found a rod about a mile away in a report, I knew either a reactor lost it's lid and ejected part of the core, or one of the dry well primary containment failed and the failure ejected the contents of at least one of the storage ponds contents.

Here is a link to scattered fuel rods.
http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content/StaticFile/jpg/2011/Apr/Week3/15973518.jpg

The news article is here;
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/A-Strong-Earthquake-Has-Hit-Japan-Shaking-Buildings-In-Tokyo-After-Release-Of-New-Fukushima-Photos/Article/201104315973503?lpos=World_News_First_World_News_Article_Teaser_Region_3&lid=ARTICLE_15973503_A_Strong_Earthquake_Has_Hit_Japan%2C_Shaking_Buildings_In_Tokyo%2C_After_Release_Of_New_Fukushima_Photos

More recent photos are here;
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/photo/2011-04/16/c_13832377.htm

The entire report, "Full Text of Human Rights Record of the United States in 2010", is worth reading. Most of the items on the list are well known, and have even come up on Slashdot.

• "The United States reports the world's highest incidence of violent crimes ...
• "According to figures released by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in September 2010, more than 6,600 travelers had been subject to electronic device searches between October 1, 2008 and June 2, 2010, nearly half of them American citizens. A report on The Wall Street Journal on September 7, 2010, said the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was sued over its policies that allegedly authorize the search and seizure of laptops, cellphones and other electronic devices without a reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing. The policies were claimed to leave no limit on how long the DHS can keep a traveler' s devices or on the scope of private information that can be searched, copied or detained. There is no provision for judicial approval or supervision."
• "According to a report on Chicago Tribune on May 12, 2010, Chicago Police was charged with arresting people without warrants, shackling them to the wall or metal benches, feeding them infrequently and holding them without bathroom breaks and giving them no bedding, which were deemed consistent with tactics of "soft torture" used to extract involuntary confessions."
• "The United States has always called itself "land of freedom," but the number of inmates in the country is the world' s largest. "
• "The U.S. regards itself as "the beacon of democracy." However, its democracy is largely based on money. According to a report from The Washington Post on October 26, 2010, U.S. House and Senate candidates shattered fundraising records for a midterm election, taking in more than 1.5 billion U.S. dollars as of October 24. The midterm election, held in November 2010, finally cost 3.98 billion U.S. dollars, the most expensive in the U.S. history. "
• "While advocating Internet freedom, the U.S. in fact imposes fairly strict restriction on cyberspace. On June 24, 2010, the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs approved the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, which will give the federal government "absolute power" to shut down the Internet under a declared national emergency. Handing government the power to control the Internet will only be the first step towards a greatly restricted Internet system, whereby individual IDs and government permission would be required to operate a website. "
• "Unemployment rate in the United States has been stubbornly high. From December 2007 to October 2010, a total of 7.5 million jobs were lost in the country " ... "The share of residents in poverty climbed to 14.3 percent in 2009, the highest level recorded since 1994 " ... . "A report issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in November 2010 showed that 14.7 percent of U.S. households were food insecure in 2009 (www.ers.usda.gov), an increase of almost 30 percent since 2006" ... "According to a report by USA Today on June 16, 2010, the number of families in homeless shelters increased 7 percent to 170,129 from fiscal year 2008 through fiscal year 2009."
• "The number of American people without health insurance increased progressively every year. "
• "The New York Times reported on May 13, 2010, that in 2009, African Americans and Latinos were 9 times more likely to be stopped by the police to receive stop-and-frisk searches than white people. "
• "So far, a total of 193 countries have joined the Convention on the Rights of the Child as states parties, but the United States is among the very few countries that have not ratified it."

These are problems the US has that aren't being fixed.

No, because the people that watch Fox news think that every other news network is part of some secret hidden political agenda and therefor it's real.

True. Most news networks don't even try to hide their political agenda.

Amusingly enough if I want a more honest opinion of any international matter I actually turn to Chinese news. Their translators maybe aren't good enough at English to sensationalise or ad lib the facts but I rather like the Xinhua's dry delivery of facts. I've seen too many politically motived fairytales in BBC, NBC and FOX to really trust them for anything more than gossip or entertainment. Not saying that I trust Xinhua much either but it's nice to read strangely phrased news that isn't dowsed in patriotism (their own non-international news of course drips with National pride and should not be avoided)

http://www.xinhuanet.com/english2010/

In protest, the Chinese Government has set up its own rival awards ceremony to the Nobel prize; the "Confucius peace prize".

I would wait a bit before that's confirmed. The only news in English I can find on it seems to indicate it doesn't exist or at least wasn't given to the recipient reported by the Associated Press. Those guys aren't often wrong but this sounds like a satire or problem in translation.

Furthermore, here's the point of view from the horse's mouth (angry version here and refusal to resolve here) and they are propping up external support (though I think it's selective in choosing Heffermehl's words).

So, yeah, censorship is bad in any form and I think the Chinese government is terrible in doing this but they do run things their own special way over there and censorship has always been the norm.

In protest, the Chinese Government has set up its own rival awards ceremony to the Nobel prize; the "Confucius peace prize".

I would wait a bit before that's confirmed. The only news in English I can find on it seems to indicate it doesn't exist or at least wasn't given to the recipient reported by the Associated Press. Those guys aren't often wrong but this sounds like a satire or problem in translation.

Furthermore, here's the point of view from the horse's mouth (angry version here and refusal to resolve here) and they are propping up external support (though I think it's selective in choosing Heffermehl's words).

So, yeah, censorship is bad in any form and I think the Chinese government is terrible in doing this but they do run things their own special way over there and censorship has always been the norm.

In protest, the Chinese Government has set up its own rival awards ceremony to the Nobel prize; the "Confucius peace prize".

I would wait a bit before that's confirmed. The only news in English I can find on it seems to indicate it doesn't exist or at least wasn't given to the recipient reported by the Associated Press. Those guys aren't often wrong but this sounds like a satire or problem in translation.

Furthermore, here's the point of view from the horse's mouth (angry version here and refusal to resolve here) and they are propping up external support (though I think it's selective in choosing Heffermehl's words).

So, yeah, censorship is bad in any form and I think the Chinese government is terrible in doing this but they do run things their own special way over there and censorship has always been the norm.

In protest, the Chinese Government has set up its own rival awards ceremony to the Nobel prize; the "Confucius peace prize".

I would wait a bit before that's confirmed. The only news in English I can find on it seems to indicate it doesn't exist or at least wasn't given to the recipient reported by the Associated Press. Those guys aren't often wrong but this sounds like a satire or problem in translation.

Furthermore, here's the point of view from the horse's mouth (angry version here and refusal to resolve here) and they are propping up external support (though I think it's selective in choosing Heffermehl's words).

So, yeah, censorship is bad in any form and I think the Chinese government is terrible in doing this but they do run things their own special way over there and censorship has always been the norm.