Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by Sau Seng La

Suspect's Dad Warns 'Hell Will Break Loose'

Sau Seng La — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 23:37:25 +0800

Boston Bomb Suspect's Dad Tells Him to Surrender, Warns ' Hell Will Break Loose' if Son Dies

The father of suspected Boston Marathon bomber called on his son today to give up peacefully, but warned the U.S. that if his son is killed "all hell will break loose."

Anzor Tsarnaev spoke to ABC News from his home in the Russian city of Makhachkala as Boston police carried out an intense dragnet for his son Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, survived a running gun battle with police during the night that left an MIT security officer dead and a Boston cop badly wounded. His older brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, died in the shootout.

The father said he spoke to his sons by phone earlier this week. "We talked about the bombing. I was worried about then," Anzor Tsarnaev said.

He said his sons reassured him, saying, "Everything is good, Daddy. Everything is very good."

The elder Tsarnaev insisted that his sons were innocent, but said he would appeal to his son to "surrender peacefully."

"Give up. Give up. You have a bright future ahead of you. Come home to Russia," the dad said.

The father warned, however, "If they killed him, then all hell would break loose."

"If they kill my second child, I will know that it is an inside job, a hit job. The police are to blame," the father told ABC News. "Someone, some organization is out to get them."

The father said his two daughters, ages 22 and 24, live in New York.

Source

Looters stealing marathon jackets after explosion

Sau Seng La — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 22:45:12 +0800

Post Boston Marathon bombing looters stealing marathon jackets,while others are just feet away critically injured

[YOUTUBE]TZ36tyRfvis[/YOUTUBE]

It's a Japanese thing

Sau Seng La — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 04:08:33 +0800

[YOUTUBE]WEMLmVZCf6M[/YOUTUBE]

North Korean leader was an all-American hero

Sau Seng La — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 01:28:45 +0800

You’re the Jong that I want
— North Korean leader was an all-American hero
— Kim Jong-un starred in school production of Grease
— Despot 'sang along to hits like Summer Nights'
By RHODRI PHILLIPS
Published: 09th April 2013

Source

Tell me war, tell me war ... Kim in school's production of Grease

WACKY US-hating dictator Kim Jong-un once played an all-American hero — in a school production of Grease.
The North Korean tyrant appeared as a slick-haired leather-jacketed member of “good” gang the T-Birds as a skinny teen, The Sun can reveal.

Social climber ... Kim, 12, on a play frame in 1995

Our snaps also show the now chubby nuclear despot, 30, in swimming trunks and larking about with fellow pupils at his posh private school.
He started at the £16,000-a-year International School of Berne in Switzerland aged 11 in 1994 and stayed until 1997.

Skinny dictator ... Kim aged 13 in swimming trunks

Kim also loved comics and watching US films such as Jurassic Park.
Pals say he enjoyed singing along to hits such as Summer Nights and You’re The One That I Want in the school production of Grease — the musical which became a hit Hollywood film with John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John in 1978.

Armageddon in line ... future North Korean leader queuing with posh pals

He even had an elite bodyguard dubbed King Kong — who went “undercover” as a 14-year-old schoolboy.
Ex-classmate Tal Rapp, 34, from Israel, said: “Everyone now looks at him as a lunatic who hates the world but the kid I remember was the quietest person I have ever met.”

Kim has told the world to expect “all-out nuclear war” as he declared tomorrow “doomsday”.

Deleted

Sau Seng La — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 01:24:40 +0800

Duplicate - deleted.

US could make preemptive strike on North Korea

Sau Seng La — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 01:24:00 +0800

Rep. Peter King: US could make preemptive strike on North Korea
By Justin Sink - 04/03/13 07:42 AM ET

Source

Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) said Tuesday that the United States had the right to take preemptive military action against North Korea if there was "solid evidence" that Kim Jon Un planned to attack the U.S. or South Korea.

"If we have good reason to believe there's going to be an attack, I believe we have the right to take preemptive action," King said on CNN's "Erin Burnett Outfront."

"I don't think we have to wait until Americans are killed or wounded or injured in any way," he continued. "I'm not saying we should be rushing into war, don't get me wrong, but if we have solid evidence that North Korea's going to take action, then I think we have a moral obligation and an absolute right to defend ourselves."

Tensions in the region have deteriorated in recent weeks, with Pyongyang announcing Wednesday that it had barred South Korean workers from a jointly run industrial zone on the border between the two countries. That announcement came just a day after officials declared their intention to restart a shuttered nuclear reactor. North Korea has escalated tensions in recent weeks, declaring a "state of war" against South Korea and threatening to attack the United States.

North Korea's actions are thought to be driven by additional United Nations sanctions that resulted from its recent nuclear test. The United States has responded to Pyongyang's posturing with a series of military drills in the region, as well as a repositioning of naval ships in waters off the Korean peninsula.

King said Tuesday night that "as of now, there's no deployment or movement or troops or any aircraft sea power whatever that would indicate any type of an attack." The White House has also suggested that North Korea's recent moves are largely symbolic, rather than substantive.

But in a telephone call Tuesday evening to Chinese Defense Minister Chang Wanquan, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel warned of a "growing threat" in the region.

"The secretary emphasized the growing threat to the U.S. and our allies posed by North Korea's aggressive pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs and expressed to General Chang the importance of sustained U.S.-China dialogue and cooperation on these issues," Pentagon spokesman George Little said in a statement obtained by Fox News.

Kim-Jong Un looking confidence on his sampan warship. But don't let that fool you.
He is hunkered down and dig-in deeper than you can imagine.

Thiel Fellowship in the U.S.

Sau Seng La — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 02:32:39 +0800

Peter Thiel Is Paying These 20 Entrepreneurs Who Can't Even Drink Yet $100,000 To Drop Out Of College

Every now and then, you'll find a brilliant entrepreneur under the age of 20 that has, say, already created nuclear fusion.

Billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel has found that person, and 19 more just like him. He is giving them $100,000 to drop out of college and become a "Thiel Fellow."

That's an offer that's hard to ignore.

As a Thiel Fellow, these 20 young guns will have access to mentorship from the Thiel Foundation's network for two years.
They'll be able to work on building revolutionary products, and technology.

We assume that in exchange, Thiel has the right to invest in whatever company they build while Thiel Fellows. It's a pretty clever way to do an incubator, when you get right down to it. Anyway, keep reading to meet the brainiacs who decided to become Thiel Fellows...

Clay Allsopp has a project that makes creating apps easier.

Age: 20
Allsopp has a startup called Apptory, which helps individuals create and distribute content for touch-screen devices.
It's done with an "intuitive, easy-to-understand interface."

Kettner Griswold wants to make building genetic constructs easier.

Age: 19
Griswold is working with fellow Thiel fellow Paul Sebexenon on a device that would allow individual labs and medical practices to create large genetic constructs in-house.
This would let labs conduct gene manipulation without having to outsource the process of getting a gene construct to some other firm.

Taylor Wilson is working on uranium detection for counter-terrorism.

Age: 18
This kid became the youngest person in history to create nuclear fusion. Since then, he's developed a low-cost way to detect enriched uranium.
He'll focus on counter-terrorism and production of medical isotopes for diagnosing and treating cancer while he's a Thiel Fellow.

Anand Gupta wants to make it easier to analyze biomedical images.

Age: 20
Gupta is developing software with fellow Thiel Fellow Tony Ho that will help doctors and researchers conduct quantitative analysis of biomedical images.
This will help doctors and researchers have more accurate diagnoses of complex diseases.

Spencer Hewett is working on radio-powered payments.

Age: 20
Hewett is working on a combination of mobile payment technology and radio-frequency identification — like near-field communication — that will help eliminate checkout lines.
He says the project will also help reduce shoplifting.

Yoonseo Kang is building a network of open-sourced hardware plans.

Age: 18
Yoonseo wants to build a network of open-sourced hardware data — including construction plans and detailed lists of construction materials.
He's building the network for the 50 most-used industrial machines that it takes to build a "civilization with modern comforts."

Jimmy Koppel is making it easier to ferret out bugs.

Age: 20
Koppel is looking to build a system for modifying software that would remove the tedious process of making sure the software meshes perfectly — even when a single line is changed.
This would streamline fixing bugs and making minor tweaks, without having to test and re-test the software to make sure it still runs.

Paul Sebexen wants to make building genetic constructs easier.

Age: 19
Sebexen is working with fellow Thiel fellow Kettner Griswold on a device that would allow individual labs and medical practices to create large genetic constructs in-house.
This would let labs conduct gene manipulation without having to outsource the process of getting a gene construct to some other firm.

Dylan Field is working on building creative tools.

Age: 20
Field is working with a fellow classmate after dropping out of Brown University to build better creative tools — not very specific, but he says he envisions a world where people define themselves by "what they create."

Ritik Malhotra has been a programmer since he was baby

Age: 19
Malhotra has been programming his whole life, starting at age 8. At age 12, he built a website that had more than 32,000 visitors.
Now he wants to provide a streamlined way of discovering and distributing content on social networking sites like Facebook.

American teenager designs compact nuclear reactor

Sau Seng La — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 00:13:21 +0800

American teenager designs compact nuclear reactor
By Agence France-Presse
Friday, March 1, 2013

Video from TED

Taylor's Homepage

Taylor's Fascinating Story

Eighteen-year-old Taylor Wilson has designed a compact nuclear reactor that could one day burn waste from old atomic weapons to power anything from homes and factories to space colonies.

The American teen, who gained fame four years ago after designing a fusion reactor he planned to build in the garage of his family’s home, shared his latest endeavor at a TED Conference in southern California on Thursday.

“It’s about bringing something old, fission, into the 21st Century,” Wilson said. “I think this has huge potential to change the world.”

He has designed a small reactor capable of generating 50-100 megawatts of electricity, enough to power as many as 100,000 homes.

The reactor can be made assembly-line style and powered by molten radioactive material from nuclear weapons, Wilson said. The relatively small, modular reactor can be shipped sealed with enough fuel to last for 30 years.

“You can plop them down anywhere in the world and they work, buried under the ground for security reasons,” he said, while detailing his design at TED.

“In the Cold War we built up this huge arsenal of nuclear weapons and we don’t need them anymore,” Wilson said. “It would be great if we could eat them up, and this reactor loves this stuff.”

His reactors are designed to spin turbines using gas instead of steam, meaning they operate at temperatures lower than those of typical nuclear reactors and don’t spew anything if there is a breach.

The fuel is in the form of molten salt, and the reactors don’t need to be pressurized, according to the teenager.

“In the event of an accident, you can just drain the core into a tank under the reactor with neutron absorbers and the reaction stops,” Wilson said.

“There is no inclination for the fission products to leave this reactor,” he said. “In an accident, the reactor may be toast, which is sorry for the power company, but there is no problem.”

Wilson, who graduated grade school in May, said he is putting off university to focus on a company he created to make Modular Fission Reactors.

He sees his competition as nations, particularly China, and the roadblocks ahead as political instead of technical.

Wilson planned to have a prototype ready in two years and a product to market in five years.

“Not only does it combat climate change, it can bring power to the developing world,” Wilson said with teenage optimism.

“Imagine having a compact reactor in a rocket designed by those planning to habitat other planets. Not only would you have power for propulsion, but power once you get there.”

The Greek Economy is Kaput

Sau Seng La — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 23:09:24 +0800

FEBRUARY 26, 2013
Staring into the Abyss
The Greek Economy is Kaput
by MIKE WHITNEY

“The Greek economy is finished. The Greek economy is in a great, great depression… There is no power, no force within the Greek economy, within Greek society that can avert it….Imagine if we were in Ohio in 1931 and we were to ask: What can Ohio politicians do to get Ohio out of the Great Depression? The answer is nothing.”

- Yanis Varoufakis, Greek economist

After 5 years of negative growth, record-high unemployment and savage cuts to essential safety-net programs, Greek society is beginning to buckle. Diabetics cannot afford their insulin, suicides and anti-depressant usage is off-the-chart, tuberculosis and HIV rates are soaring, and desperate pensioners in Athens have been reduced to dumpster diving outside grocery stores for a few scraps of food to feed themselves and their families. The shocking devolution of a modern nation into a failed state did not happen overnight or without the help of EU bureaucrats and financial potentates who dictate economic policy from Brussels, Frankfort and Berlin. These so-called “managers” have steered the 17-member eurozone into the biggest slump since the Great Depression, imposing belt tightening measures that have choked off growth, sent unemployment skyrocketing, and incited protest and street violence across the continent. Greece has been particularly hard hit. Poverty and destitution are now widespread. The country is a basketcase. Here’s more from an article in the Guardian:

“Greece is currently in the centre of a humanitarian crisis…. A large proportion of Greek households currently live in conditions of “material deprivation”. A little more than 11% actually live in “extreme material deprivation”, which means without enough heating, electricity, and use of either a car or a telephone…There has been explosive growth in soup kitchens and general food distribution. … the Church of Greece distributes approximately 250,000 daily rations… By recent government order, municipal rations will be expanded further because of rising incidence of children fainting at school due to low calorie intake.

The evidence of poverty, inequality, and inability to access primary services confirms the increasingly desperate statements by people at the frontline.” (“Greece is facing a humanitarian crisis”, Guardian)

The Guardian concedes that there are political reasons why the crisis has not been adequately covered in the media. “By acknowledging the severity of the situation, the Greek government and the EU would also have admitted that the current state of affairs has been brought about by the so-called economic “rescue” of Greece. So the authorities have chosen to keep quiet.” (Guardian)

Greece has not been rescued nor was that ever the plan. From the beginning, austerity was meant to punish and humiliate, to shrink the state and expropriate anything of value. Still the charade goes on, and the EU stewards continue to claim that their discredited theory is achieving its objectives. Case in point, here’s vice president of the European Commission, Olli Rehn, cheerleading austerity as the antidote to Europe’s debt woes.

“The decisive policy action undertaken recently is paving the way for a return to recovery. We must stay the course of reform and avoid any loss of momentum, which could undermine the turnaround in confidence that is under way, delaying the needed upswing in growth and job creation.”

There is no recovery. The EZ is in the throes of a Depression. Economic fundamentals have been jettisoned to advance the interests of the wealthy overlords who benefit from from the imiseration of working people. Austerity is a sham that has laid much of the south to waste. An increasing number of families are now abandoning their children because they’re no longer able to provide for them. According to Press TV:

“There has been an increase in the number of newborn babies dumped outside clinics and offloaded on charities ….”Families are breaking up, instances are mounting of mothers and fathers no longer being able to bring up their own kids,” General Secretary of the civil servants’ union ADEDY, Ilias Ilioupolis said.” (“Greek crisis ups abandoned kids”, Press TV)

The political implications of austerity are equally worrisome. Growing opposition to Brussels diktats has led to a resurgence of right wing extremism notably the uber-nationalist Golden Dawn whose Nazi-like standard and anti-immigrant rhetoric is now finding broader appeal among Greece’s unemployed and disaffected youth. Xenophobia and anti-semitism are on the rise. Policymakers in Brussels could reverse this dangerous trend, but have chosen to intensify Greece’s humiliation by increasing their demands and withholding desperately needed fiscal assistance. As a result, reactionary elements are gaining strength while democratic institutions are progressively weakening. Meanwhile, the EZ economy continues to deteriorate.

In Greece, for example, 3rd quarter output shrank by 7.2 percent, deeper than the 2nd quarter’s 6.3 percent decline. That means the economy is getting worse. It also means that Greece will not meet its deficit targets and will be forced to implement more austerity measures. As the government slashes public investment, demand will weaken, state revenues will fall, and the severity of the slump will intensify. The same pattern has been repeated for 20 quarters without change. Greece is being carved up and sold to deep-pocket corporations and wealthy businessmen. It’s being kept on life-support so that EU banks and bondholders avoid the losses for which they alone are responsible. The EU’s criminal elite have reduced the country to rubble.

THE MEMORANDUM: A death warrant for Greece

In February 2012, Greek parliamentarians signed the nation’s death warrant by ratifying the heinous “Memorandum of Understanding” (MOU), a document that effectively repeals Greek sovereignty and hands the nation over to foreign banks and corporations. The 43-page edict imposes strict rules on everything from reduced spending on life-saving drugs to “lifting constraints for retailers to sell restricted product categories such as baby food.”

The MOU calls for a 10 percent cuts to government workers wages, cuts to “social security funds and hospitals”, and more privatizing of publicly-owned assets, all of which has further shrunk GDP. Ratherpath for Greece to exit its present slump, the Memorandum curtails public spending while creating new opportunities for exploitation and plunder. Here’s an excerpt from the MOU:

“The Government stands ready to offer for sale its remaining stakes in state-owned enterprises, if necessary in order to reach the privatisation objectives. Public control will be limited only to cases of critical network infrastructure.”

Public assets are being sold for pennies on the dollar to foreign corporations and entrepreneurs. Then there’s this:

“The Government will neither propose nor implement measures which may infringe the rules on the free movement of capital.”

In Greece, the interests of the people have been subordinated to the interests of profitmaking industries and their shareholders. Capital rules. The MOU turns the basic principal of representative government on its head. The memo also features predictable attack on organised labor. Here’s a clip:

“The Government will take measures to foster a rapid adjustment of labour costs to fight unemployment and restore cost-competitiveness, ensure the effectiveness of recent labour market reforms, align labour conditions in former state-owned enterprises to those in the rest of the private sector and make working hours arrangements more flexible. This strategy should aim at reducing nominal unit labour costs in the business economy by 15 percent in 2012-14. At the same time, the Government will promote smooth wage bargaining at the various levels and fight undeclared work.”

The Greek government must revoke collective bargaining rights and reject minimum wage laws that undermine “cost-competitiveness”, an Orwellian term which means “slave wages”. The authors of this rancid warrant try to conceal their animus for working people behind the public relations invention, “debt crisis”, but their real intention is clear. Here’s more from the MOU:

“The Government establishes a task force (to) review the ….judicial case management, including the possibility of removing dormant cases from court registers.” …Following on the submission of the work plan for the reduction of the backlog of tax cases in all administrative tribunals and administrative courts of appeal in January 2012, which provides for intermediate targets for reducing the backlog by at least 50 per cent by end-June 2012, by at least 80 per cent by end-December 2012 and for the full clearance of the backlog by end-July 2013, the Government presents by end-May 2012.”

The MOU provides a get-out-of-jail-for-free card for tax cheats. How does that help to balance the budget? It doesn’t, but it does help to illustrate that the “debt crisis” is a fraud designed to crack open Greece like a pinata and steal whatever big finance and their corporate colleagues can lay their hands on.

The financial oligarchy is now using its political agents in Athens to intensify police state repression and quash any outbreak of organized resistance. According to the World Socialist Web Site:

“The Greek government has now resorted to martial law on four separate occasions to force striking workers back to work since the European Union began dictating austerity measures for Greece. …Any form of effective collective resistance against the relentless austerity measures that have already cost tens of thousands of jobs and slashed wages and pensions has been effectively declared illegal…

The attack on the right to strike in Greece is being carried out in collaboration with and support from other European governments and EU institutions. The so-called “troika”—the International Monetary Fund (IMF), European Commission and European Central Bank (ECB)—monitors every measure taken by the Greek government and has deployed observers to watch over specific Greek ministries. (“Greek government imposes martial law on ferry strikers”, World Socialist Web Site)

Austerity is being used to mask the looting of Greece by foreign capital. The troika-led attack on the battered nation has pushed youth unemployment above 60 percent, reduced millions of working people to a state of “extreme material deprivation”, and left the public health care system in a shambles.

Retail Apocalypse:

Sau Seng La — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 06:07:41 +0800

Retail Apocalypse: Why Are Major Retail Chains All Over America Collapsing? Sears, J.C. Penney, Best Buy and RadioShack Are All Going To Close Hundreds of Stores Before The End of 2013!
February 17th, 2013
by Michael

If the economy is improving, then why are many of the largest retail chains in America closing hundreds of stores? When I was growing up, Sears, J.C. Penney, Best Buy and Radio Shack were all considered to be unstoppable retail powerhouses. But now it is being projected that all of them will close hundreds of stores before the end of 2013. Even Wal-Mart is running into problems. A recent internal Wal-Mart memo that was leaked to Bloomberg described February sales as a “total disaster”. So why is this happening? Why are major retail chains all over America collapsing? Is the “retail apocalypse” upon us? Well, the truth is that this is just another sign that the U.S. economy is falling apart right in front of our eyes. Incomes are declining, taxes are going up, government dependence is at an all-time high, and according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics the percentage of the U.S. labor force that is employed has been steadily falling since 2006. The top 10% of all income earners in the U.S. are still doing very well, but most U.S. consumers are either flat broke or are drowning in debt. The large disposable incomes that the big retail chains have depended upon in the past simply are not there anymore. So retail chains all over the United States are now closing up unprofitable stores. This is especially true in low income areas.

When you step back and take a look at the bigger picture, the rapid decline of some of our largest retail chains really is stunning.

It is happening already in some areas, but soon half empty malls and boarded up storefronts will litter the landscapes of cities all over America.

Just check out some of these store closing numbers for 2013. These numbers are from a recent Yahoo Finance article…

Best Buy

Forecast store closings: 200 to 250

Sears Holding Corp.

Forecast store closings: Kmart 175 to 225, Sears 100 to 125

J.C. Penney

Forecast store closings: 300 to 350

Office Depot

Forecast store closings: 125 to 150

Barnes & Noble

Forecast store closings: 190 to 240, per company comments

Gamestop

Forecast store closings: 500 to 600

OfficeMax

Forecast store closings: 150 to 175

RadioShack

Forecast store closings: 450 to 550

The RadioShack in a nearby town just closed up where I live. This is all happening so fast that it is hard to believe.

But the truth is that those store closings are not the entire story. When you dig deeper you find a lot more retailers that are in trouble.

For example, Blockbuster recently announced that this year they will be closing about 300 stores and eliminating about 3,000 jobs.

Toy manufacturer Hasbro recently announced that they will be reducing the size of their workforce by about 10 percent.

Even Wal-Mart is going through a tough stretch right now. According to documents that were leaked to Bloomberg, Wal-Mart is having an absolutely disastrous February…

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. had the worst sales start to a month in seven years as payroll-tax increases hit shoppers already battling a slow economy, according to internal e-mails obtained by Bloomberg News.

“In case you haven’t seen a sales report these days, February MTD sales are a total disaster,” Jerry Murray, Wal- Mart’s vice president of finance and logistics, said in a Feb. 12 e-mail to other executives, referring to month-to-date sales. “The worst start to a month I have seen in my ~7 years with the company.”

So what in the world is going on here?

The mainstream media continues to proclaim that we are experiencing a robust “economic recovery”, but at the same time there are a whole host of indications that things are continually getting worse.

Even global cell phone sales actually declined slightly in 2012. That was the first time that has happened since the last recession.

Perhaps it is time that we faced the truth. The middle class is shrinking, incomes are declining and there are not nearly as many jobs as there used to be.

So how can the mainstream media be talking about how “good” things are if we still have 6.4 million fewer jobs than we had back in November 2007?

And sadly, things may soon be getting a lot worse. If Congress does not do anything about the “sequester”, millions of federal workers may shortly be facing some very painful furloughs according to CNN…

If you still live in an area of the country where the stores and the restaurants are booming, you should be very thankful because that is not the reality for most of the country.

I often write about the stunning economic decline of major cities such as Detroit, but there are huge sections of rural America that are in even worse shape than Detroit in many ways.

For example, many Indian reservations all over America have been shamefully neglected by the federal government and have become hotbeds for crime, drugs and poverty.

Business Insider recently profiled the Wind River Indian reservation in western Wyoming. The following is a brief excerpt from that outstanding article…

The Wind River Indian Reservation is not an easy place to get to, but I had to see it for myself.

Thirty-five-hundred square miles of prairie and mountains in western Wyoming, the reservation is home to bitter ancestral enemies: the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes.

Even among reservations, it’s renowned for brutal crime, widespread drug use, and legal dumping of toxic waste.

You can see some amazing photos of the Wind River Indian reservation right here.

It is hard to believe that there are places like that in America, but the truth is that conditions like that are spreading to more U.S. communities with each passing day.

We are a nation that is in an advanced state of decline. But as long as the financial markets are okay, our leaders don’t seem too concerned about the suffering that everyone else is going through.

In fact, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan essentially admitted as much during a recent interview with CNBC. The following is how a Zero Hedge article summarized that interview…

Starting at around 1:50, Greenspan states the odds of sequester occurring are very high – in fact, the playdough-faced ex-Chair-head notes, “I find it very difficult to find a scenario in which [the sequester] doesn’t happen” But when asked how this will affect the economy, Awkward Alan is unusually clearly spoken - “the issue is how does it affect the stock market.”

While not so many of our leaders have taken the path to direct truthiness, Greenspan somewhat shocks a Botox’d and babbling Bartiromo when he admits “the stock market is the key player in the game of economic growth.”

Bartiromo shifts uncomfortably in her seat, strokes her imaginary beard and stares blankly as Greenspan explains that while the sequester will have a real effect on the real economy, “if the stock market can hold up through this, then the effect will be rather minor.”

Do you see?

As long as the stock market is moving higher they think that everything is just fine and dandy.

And the Obama administration?

They continue to pursue the same policies that got us into this mess.

Their idea of “economic reform” is to threaten to sue businesses that do not hire ex-convicts.

And of course now that Obama has been re-elected he is putting a tremendous amount of effort into “stimulating the economy”.

For example, he spent this weekend golfing in Florida, and the Obamas recently spent about 20 million taxpayer dollars vacationing in Hawaii.

Meanwhile, the U.S. economy is getting worse with each passing day.

If you doubt that economic conditions are getting worse, please read this article: “Show This To Anyone That Believes That ‘Things Are Getting Better’ In America“.

When you look at the cold, hard numbers, it is undeniable what is happening to America.

And our leaders are not doing anything to fix our problems. In fact, most of the time they are just making things worse.

So buckle up and get prepared. We are in for very bumpy ride, and this is only just the beginning.

Airport Rage: Chinese Diplomat Goes Wild

Sau Seng La — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 05:20:52 +0800

Official trashes departure gate in a rage after missing flight 'because he stopped to get breakfast'

Hilarious video emerged today of a Chinese Communist official trashing an airport boarding gate in a rage after missing his flight.
Yan Linkun and his wife were caught on CCTV trying to board at Changshui International Airport when they are reportedly told the plane had already left.

Mr Yan initially reacts by pushing violently at the doors, but as his temper boils over he starts ripping out computers on the steward's desk and throwing them to the ground.

At this point, a large crowd, including security guards, gathers to watch the commotion.
But undeterred, Mr Yan picks up a nearby sign and tries to smash the glass door with it and carries on even when the sign has broken.

Eventually, Mr Yan calms down when airport officials arrive, but he continues to remonstrate about his apparent injustice.

The Shanghaist later identified Mr Yan, who is a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) for Shizong county in Yunnan province, reported The Inquisitr.

Chinese officials have confirmed he and his wife missed their flight after grabbing something to eat for breakfast.
It is not yet know known if he will be punished for his outburst.

[YOUTUBE]6iZ_JbUbU50[/YOUTUBE]

When you have lost everything and nothing

Sau Seng La — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 00:34:32 +0800

QUOTE

Fujimoto is divorced, and says “I have no family, no friends, no girlfriend. I am alone in life.”

But he does have three daughters, whom he hasn’t seen for five years, “not even on Facebook or the Internet, nothing. And that saddens me deeply,” he said as he wiped away a tear.

Article

https://www.facebook.com/toshifumi.fujimoto.52?fref=ts

[YOUTUBE]1MN8MAsbr9w[/YOUTUBE]

The largest iceberg breakup

Sau Seng La — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 09:23:57 +0800

[YOUTUBE]YoA_Z7y8f6Q#![/YOUTUBE]

10 things foreign guys do that make

Sau Seng La — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 22:03:06 +0800

How many of you gaijin done this in Japan or anywhere else?

10 things foreign guys do that make Japanese girls fall head over heels
http://www.japantoday.com/category/lifesty...head-over-heels
By Steven Simonitch

LIFESTYLE JUL. 10, 2012 - 05:47AM JST ( 174 )TOKYO —
While marriage rates in Japan have been declining overall, a growing number of Japanese women seem to be giving up on their male counterparts and dating foreign men.

So what is it about foreign guys that draws Japanese women to them? Kanae Hara at Gow Magazine writes: “Just this year, I’ve had one friend get married to an American and another to an Australian. Both of them moved overseas with their partners. They both tell me that foreigners are more expressive with their love and make them feel happy to have been born a woman.“

Hara continues by sharing 10 ways foreign guys express their affection that make their Japanese girlfriends fall head over heels. We’ve translated the list below, so be sure to take notes if you’re looking for some pointers on how to woo a Japanese girl!

1. A real proposal
“His proposal was amazing! He actually got down on one knee and, while looking straight into my eyes, said: “Will you marry me?” Then he handed me a diamond ring!” (31-years-old/Japanese, 34-year-old/English)

2. Flattering text messages
“His texts always start with ‘To the most beautiful girl in the world’. I think being able to use a phrase like that naturally is something only foreigners can do.” (26/Japanese, 29/Spain)

3. Makeup flowers
“He sends a bouquet of flowers to my apartment or work after we get in a fight. It’s embarrassing but I think it’s sweet.” (29/Japanese, 27/English)

4. Mornings just like in the movies
“On days off he makes breakfast for me while I’m still in bed and wakes me up by kissing me while saying ‘Hurry, I want to see myself in those beautiful eyes’. It’s like something from a movie scene, I never thought I’d experience it myself.” (33/Japanese, 37/French)

5. A flower for every occasion
“Our first meal together, the first time we held hands: he uses every ‘first’ we share as an opportunity to slip me a flower.” (30/Japanese, 28/Greek)

6. Leaving his love in a letter
“Since he has to leave for work early in the morning, he always leaves me a letter with a short message. I feel his love for me in his handwriting.” (28/Japanese, 26/Chinese)

7. Saying “I love you” on the phone
“He always says ‘I love you’ before hanging up the phone. I still haven’t gotten used to it and it’s embrassing.” (29/Japanese, 26/American)

8. The first and last bite
“He’s so kind, it drives me absolutely crazy for him. I was especially surprised at how he always gives me the first and last bite when we share food.” (32/Japanese, 27/Korean)

9. Eat, sleep, breathe, kiss
“He kisses my over 10 times a day while whispering words of affection. It’s just natural for him.” (36/Japanese, 32/Italian)

10. Pet names
“There are many different words to express affection in his language. Even when simply addressing me, he tenderly calls me ‘my love’ or ‘my treasure’. (34/Japanese, 38/French)

By contrast, Japanese men are known for being shy and inept at expressing their feelings to women. Therefore many Japanese women fear that dating a Japanese man will bring them a life of monotony, with no romantic proposals (some Japanese men propose by asking “will you make me miso soup for the rest of my life?”) and never once being told “I love you”.

So what do you guys and girls think? Are Japanese girls getting too worked up over cheesy romance or should Japanese guys start taking lessons before it’s too late?

Source: Gow Magazine

The Love of Lions

Sau Seng La — Sat, 16 Jun 2012 05:02:11 +0800

The man who loved lions or should I say, loved by lions.

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A kind word from Sean Connery

Sau Seng La — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 08:12:21 +0800