Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually prepared to put boots on the ground and launch military operations outside South East Asia and the Far East it will never truly dominate the world in the way the US has for the last 50-100 years, in both foreign and economic policy
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazing, and also disconcerting. I stayed with Palestinian friends in East Jerusalem and wandered about quite safely on foot for a few weeks with Fox jr. There are armed soldiers about, but mostly bored standing guard.
To stand on the Mount of Olives, to walk through Gethsemane, to see the Wall of Solomon's temple is a bit unreal. It is also quite beautiful and all the peoples helpful. The only people that gave me a hard time were airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
I (and along with about 10 others) did a runner from a restaurant in Jerusalem.....I still fell ashamed......
Sometimes the Brits abroad can be bloody obnoxious, thoughtless and the rest, especially when alcohol is concerned.....
I was just struck by a thought during my earlier reply...could you imagine the awfulness of having to spend some significant time with Theresa? What could she talk about? Harry Potter or Strong and Stable? Or shoes?
I think you may be surprised how much you both have in common, once you start talking.
1 Westmorland & Lonsdale 51.5 - Won, likely to win again 2 Orkney & Shetland 41.4 - Won, likely to win again 3 Sheffield Hallam 40.0 - Won, probably going to win again 4 Norfolk North 39.1 - Won, dead cert to lose 5 Eastbourne 38.2 - Lost. Anyone know if there's a shot? Retread candidate, majority under 1000 6 Twickenham 38.0 - Lost, probably lost again. 7 Thornbury & Yate 37.9 Lost, probably lose again. (Webb's seat, not restanding) 8 Leeds North West 36.8 Won, probable loss. 9 Dunbartonshire East 36.3 Lost, possible win (lowest drop in percentage, but still not a dead cert by any means) 10 Ross, Skye & Lochaber 35.9 Lost, probably lose again- long way back 11 Lewes 35.9 Lost, probably lose again - no UKIP candidate 12 Ceredigion 35.9 Won, probably win again. 13 Caithness, Sutherland & Easter Ross 35.1 Loss, probably lose again - needs lots of tacticals. 14 Carshalton & Wallington 34.9 Won, probable loss. 15 Cambridge 34.9 - Loss, possible win. Smallest majority in country for Lab.
I expect Lamb to hold Norfolk North.
Others tell me I am over pessimistic about his chances, although frankly the flatlining of the party nationally while the Tories increase has made me very doubful about them generally, particularly with Labour ticking up.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazing, and also disconcerting. I stayed with Palestinian friends in East Jerusalem and wandered about quite safely on foot for a few weeks with Fox jr. There are armed soldiers about, but mostly bored standing guard.
To stand on the Mount of Olives, to walk through Gethsemane, to see the Wall of Solomon's temple is a bit unreal. It is also quite beautiful and all the peoples helpful. The only people that gave me a hard time were airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After my acquittal of rape, in my early 20s, I went to live in Egypt for a few months. While I was there, I went overland to Israel, and Jerusalem, and baptised myself in the Garden of Gethsemane with a bottle of Jordan water (i.e. a a bottle of mineral water, from the Jordan, bought in a kiosk)
It was very moving. Jerusalem was wonderful.
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Kudos if he founded and sold a computer games business in the 1980s, as it would appear!
Computer games in those days mostly consisted of typing in pages and pages of Basic code from a magazine and then spending hours trying to debug it to find the inevitable typos.
Ah, the days before hooking it up to your tape player and waiting 10-20 mins for it to load.
Those were the days. Saving the work by recording on a tape recorder was the only way to avoid having to type it all in again the next time, as I guess you remember.
Oh for the days when you turned on your PC and all that you saw on the screen was:
Dr Fisher's forecast today, compared with last week's shows the Tories down 5 seats, Labour up 7 seats and the SNP down 3 seats. Overall the Tories' majority is shown as having fallen from 132 to 123 seats. Over the past week their lead in the polls, which is one of Dr. Fisher's sources of information has declined by "just under 2%" to 16.5%.
You need to switch the argument around. How has America benefited from its imperial interventions since the 60s? You can argue that Korea was a necessary victory. But since then, it's mainly been trivial, or wasteful, or catastrophic.
Vietnam was wasteful, Iraq was catastrophic.
America is Britain in about 1900, or 1905. It still rules the world militarily, but others have used the peace it imposed, to get much richer and stronger, and they will soon overtake.
I am not arguing being the world's policeman is a way to get rich but you cannot truly be a global superpower if you do not come at least close to that status and not all US interventions have been disasters, Gulf War 1 for example or Panama and even Afghanistan eventually got rid of Bin Laden. Japan showed itself willing to intervene well beyond its borders in WW2 even if in the wrong way. Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
Dr Fisher's forecast today, compared with last week's shows the Tories down 5 seats, Labour up 7 seats and the SNP down 3 seats. Overall the Tories' majority is shown as having fallen from 132 to 123 seats. Over the past week their lead in the polls, which is one of Dr. Fisher's sources of information has declined by "just under 2%" to 16.5%.
I still just cant see this size of majority. I'm still on the thinking that a fair number of the Conservative votes are stacking up where they are wasted.
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
China will clearly be the main economic rival for the US but in foreign policy terms it is Russia, not China, the US has to worry about
1 Westmorland & Lonsdale 51.5 - Won, likely to win again 2 Orkney & Shetland 41.4 - Won, likely to win again 3 Sheffield Hallam 40.0 - Won, probably going to win again 4 Norfolk North 39.1 - Won, dead cert to lose 5 Eastbourne 38.2 - Lost. Anyone know if there's a shot? Retread candidate, majority under 1000 6 Twickenham 38.0 - Lost, probably lost again. 7 Thornbury & Yate 37.9 Lost, probably lose again. (Webb's seat, not restanding) 8 Leeds North West 36.8 Won, probable loss. 9 Dunbartonshire East 36.3 Lost, possible win (lowest drop in percentage, but still not a dead cert by any means) 10 Ross, Skye & Lochaber 35.9 Lost, probably lose again- long way back 11 Lewes 35.9 Lost, probably lose again - no UKIP candidate 12 Ceredigion 35.9 Won, probably win again. 13 Caithness, Sutherland & Easter Ross 35.1 Loss, probably lose again - needs lots of tacticals. 14 Carshalton & Wallington 34.9 Won, probable loss. 15 Cambridge 34.9 - Loss, possible win. Smallest majority in country for Lab.
I expect Lamb to hold Norfolk North.
Others tell me I am over pessimistic about his chances, although frankly the flatlining of the party nationally while the Tories increase has made me very doubful about them generally, particularly with Labour ticking up.
I am in Norwich North and think it highly unlikely that UKIP vote will switch to the Tories there in the way that many assume. In the local elections on May 4th much of the former UKIP vote appeared to go LibDem.
1 Westmorland & Lonsdale 51.5 - Won, likely to win again 2 Orkney & Shetland 41.4 - Won, likely to win again 3 Sheffield Hallam 40.0 - Won, probably going to win again 4 Norfolk North 39.1 - Won, dead cert to lose 5 Eastbourne 38.2 - Lost. Anyone know if there's a shot? Retread candidate, majority under 1000 6 Twickenham 38.0 - Lost, probably lost again. 7 Thornbury & Yate 37.9 Lost, probably lose again. (Webb's seat, not restanding) 8 Leeds North West 36.8 Won, probable loss. 9 Dunbartonshire East 36.3 Lost, possible win (lowest drop in percentage, but still not a dead cert by any means) 10 Ross, Skye & Lochaber 35.9 Lost, probably lose again- long way back 11 Lewes 35.9 Lost, probably lose again - no UKIP candidate 12 Ceredigion 35.9 Won, probably win again. 13 Caithness, Sutherland & Easter Ross 35.1 Loss, probably lose again - needs lots of tacticals. 14 Carshalton & Wallington 34.9 Won, probable loss. 15 Cambridge 34.9 - Loss, possible win. Smallest majority in country for Lab.
I expect Lamb to hold Norfolk North.
Others tell me I am over pessimistic about his chances, although frankly the flatlining of the party nationally while the Tories increase has made me very doubful about them generally, particularly with Labour ticking up.
The key for the LibDem defences is whether the Tory vote share starts ticking down. The Labour VI rating is pretty much irrelevant since most of the LibDem ground campaigns will have squeezed the Labour vote down in the seats they are defending. If the Tory vote becomes soft, their prospects improve; if not, not so much.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazing, and also disconcerting. I stayed with Palestinian friends in East Jerusalem and wandered about quite safely on foot for a few weeks with Fox jr. There are armed soldiers about, but mostly bored standing guard.
To stand on the Mount of Olives, to walk through Gethsemane, to see the Wall of Solomon's temple is a bit unreal. It is also quite beautiful and all the peoples helpful. The only people that gave me a hard time were airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After my acquittal of rape, in my early 20s, I went to live in Egypt for a few months. While I was there, I went overland to Israel, and Jerusalem, and baptised myself in the Garden of Gethsemane with a bottle of Jordan water (i.e. a a bottle of mineral water, from the Jordan, bought in a kiosk)
It was very moving. Jerusalem was wonderful.
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolutely and completely true. It ain't just the Yanks (or the Brits or the Germans or whatever). Almost everyone is getting fatter.
Gulf state Arabians are just HUGE. Australia has a massive obesity problem. I've seen the same blobbing effect in Sicily, and South Africa. Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
Tuscans aren't...a summer on the beach is ample motivation to stay slim....
Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
That's absurd. China has already profoundly changed the entire world in the course of its industrialisation and the change is accelerating with huge strategic investments that place China at the centre of global economic power.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
That's absurd. China has already profoundly changed the entire world in the course of its industrialisation and the change is accelerating with huge strategic investments that place China at the centre of global economic power.
Agreed...
In the next decades China sneezes and we'll all get a cold.....
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
China will clearly be the main economic rival for the US but in foreign policy terms it is Russia, not China, the US has to worry about
Why? The biggest threats to US dominance will come from Chinese economic imperialism and Islamic terrorism. With both of those, Russia is a potential ally.
Dr Fisher's forecast today, compared with last week's shows the Tories down 5 seats, Labour up 7 seats and the SNP down 3 seats. Overall the Tories' majority is shown as having fallen from 132 to 123 seats. Over the past week their lead in the polls, which is one of Dr. Fisher's sources of information has declined by "just under 2%" to 16.5%.
I still just cant see this size of majority. I'm still on the thinking that a fair number of the Conservative votes are stacking up where they are wasted.
Dr Fisher does have an excellent record at GEs though TBF
China will clearly be the main economic rival for the US but in foreign policy terms it is Russia, not China, the US has to worry about
Russia is a nuisance, but ultimately cannot win at the game it has chosen to play. The only real question is how much damage it will cause to itself in its ultimate capitulation. The odds of the Russian Federation going the same way as the USSR are steadily increasing.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazing, and also disconcerting. I stayed with Palestinian friends in East Jerusalem and wandered about quite safely on foot for a few weeks with Fox jr. There are armed soldiers about, but mostly bored standing guard.
To stand on the Mount of Olives, to walk through Gethsemane, to see the Wall of Solomon's temple is a bit unreal. It is also quite beautiful and all the peoples helpful. The only people that gave me a hard time were airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After my acquittal of rape, in my early 20s, I went to live in Egypt for a few months. While I was there, I went overland to Israel, and Jerusalem, and baptised myself in the Garden of Gethsemane with a bottle of Jordan water (i.e. a a bottle of mineral water, from the Jordan, bought in a kiosk)
It was very moving. Jerusalem was wonderful.
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolutely and completely true. It ain't just the Yanks (or the Brits or the Germans or whatever). Almost everyone is getting fatter.
Gulf state Arabians are just HUGE. Australia has a massive obesity problem. I've seen the same blobbing effect in Sicily, and South Africa. Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
The Venezuelan government seem to have found a way to but the international obesity epidemic
I was musing on Glasgow constituencies. Labour are the Unionist party in greatest strength and did respectably in the council elections. It was the site of enormous SNP swings in 2015, often circa 40%. OK, it was pro Sindy but it wouldn't take a big swing away to the Unionist opposition for Labour to gain a seat or two. It is a place where Corbynism has a bit of appeal.
I would have thought South and SouthWest would be the most Unionist constituencies, and 14/1and 20/1 respectively for Labour. Ibrox is in SW.
Worth a small punt on an SNP falling tide?
With votes of 54% and 57% respectively that is some falling tide you'd need.
What might get you closer is differential turnout, Glasgow SW turnout was up 7% on 2010 but to be honest I see no realistic path towards the SNP losing those seats.
East Lothian at 10-1 was as far as I was prepared to back Labour in Scotland
Yougov keeping me busy today. 2 political surveys. Double dose of JC votes from me Also done our PV's today. Local Labour candidate guaranteed 2 votes from this household.
My only comment is that I don't think Baxter picks up targeting or special circumstances and that makes the outcome less predictable. For instance Baxter has Richmond Park with a Tory majority of 32,000! Crazy.
I think the LibDems will get about 15 of the following seats (in rank order of probability according to the bookies) which reduces your Tory estimated majority to 64-114. I still think Tory majority of 75-99 is good value on Betfair at 10.
Westmorland and Lonsdale 95% Leeds North West 90% Ceredigion Sheffield, Hallam Orkney and Shetland 80% Cambridge EdinBorough West 70% Twickenham East Dunbartonshire 60% Bermondsey and Old Southwark Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross North East Fife North Norfolk Cardiff Central Kingston and Surbiton 50% Carshalton and Wallington Lewes Richmond Park St Ives Bath Burnley Southport Birmingham, Yardley 40% Eastbourne Hornsey and Wood Green Ross, Skye and Lochaber St Albans Thornbury and Yate Portsmouth South 30% Vauxhall North Devon Cheltenham Brecon and Radnorshire Argyll and Bute Cheadle
The criticism of UNS is, of course, entirely valid - especially at the lower end of my predicted vote share range, I think it likely that differential swings would deliver rather more additional seats to the Tories in the provinces than they'd fail to pick up through stubborn Labour defences in London. Whilst I am no longer quite as confident as I was, I'm reasonably sure that the Conservatives will end up with a majority no lower than 80-90.
My initial projection, which I'm going to stick to, for the Liberal Democrats is 13; that was based on an assessment of their existing seats plus the most likely available marginals, which implies an approximately neutral position versus the Conservatives (the two parties each losing perhaps three seats to the other,) with the Lib Dems' net gains coming from Labour and the SNP. I really don't see them getting that far, and that's taking into account my assumption that they're doing a little bit better than the polls suggest. If the polls are accurate and they're back to where they started in 2015, then their final seat total could be in single figures again.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I've just ordered Google Home for my bedroom, and Amazon Echo for my living room. I'm gonna do a one man Which consumer test.
Anyone got an idea who will win?
Alexa is amazing
Isn't there a movie about a guy who falls in love with the voice of his electronic home assistant? (Given the wealth of literature on the subject, we all know humans are very keen on teaching machine intelligence to love)
She?
Isn't that H. Rider Haggard?
Or am I displaying an unseemly knowledge of Victorian pot-boilers?
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazwere airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After my acquittal of rape, in my early 20s, I went to live in Egypt for a few months. While I was there, I went overland to Israel, and Jerusalem, and baptised myself in the Garden of Gethsemane with a bottle of Jordan water (i.e. a a bottle of mineral water, from the Jordan, bought in a kiosk)
It was very moving. Jerusalem was wonderful.
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolutely and completely true. It ain't just the Yanks (or the Brits or the Germans or whatever). Almost everyone is getting fatter.
Gulf state Arabians are just HUGE. Australia has a massive obesity problem. I've seen the same blobbing effect in Sicily, and South Africa. Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
Tuscans aren't...a summer on the beach is ample motivation to stay slim....
True. Northern Italians are so vain - bella figura and all that - the pressure to stay thin supersedes the overwhelming global tendency to blob out, for now. South of Rome, they tend to be more *relaxed*. I liked the way the first series of Gomorrah showed this. Big fat Italian men.
On a more optimistic note, we are probably quite close to solving obesity, and then we can all eat what the F we like, even though no one will have a job.
I don't have a job and have just chomped 6 bags of Walkers cheese and onion crisps...and would happily eat some more if they were around...
Terrible....a month of being back in Blighty and am reduced to this....
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
IIRC, it used to be thought that the one-child policy + preference for male children would eventually lead to the Chinese seeking wives from abroad, and that this seeking might be driven militarily.
Presumably the problem never materialised, or they resolved it some other way.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazing, and also disconcerting. I stayed with Palestinian friends in East Jerusalem and wandered about quite safely on foot for a few weeks with Fox jr. There are armed soldiers about, but mostly bored standing guard.
To stand on the Mount of Olives, to walk through Gethsemane, to see the Wall of Solomon's temple is a bit unreal. It is also quite beautiful and all the peoples helpful. The only people that gave me a hard time were airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After my acquittal of rape, in my early 20s, I went to live in Egypt for a few months. While I was there, I went overland to Israel, and Jerusalem, and baptised myself in the Garden of Gethsemane with a bottle of Jordan water (i.e. a a bottle of mineral water, from the Jordan, bought in a kiosk)
It was very moving. Jerusalem was wonderful.
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolutely and completely true. It ain't just the Yanks (or the Brits or the Germans or whatever). Almost everyone is getting fatter.
Gulf state Arabians are just HUGE. Australia has a massive obesity problem. I've seen the same blobbing effect in Sicily, and South Africa. Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
The Venezuelan government seem to have found a way to but the international obesity epidemic
Report from the field....visit to Bath today...supposedly a key Tory / Lib Dem marginal....is there an election on? It was hard to tell. A few and I mean a few placards in some gardens (one for the lib dem candidate that stepped down) and that was about it.
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world, it clearly has the capacity but when has it bothered to use it? Not since the Korean War and in a very limited capacity the Vietnam War as far as I can see. Russia projects itself far more on the world stage in terms of military intervention than China does.
I agree that China will certainly be the largest economy, not that surprising given it is the world's largest population but it needs innovation and original ideas too
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
IIRC, it used to be thought that the one-child policy + preference for male children would eventually lead to the Chinese seeking wives from abroad, and that this seeking might be driven militarily.
Presumably the problem never materialised, or they resolved it some other way.
Didn't a PBer once claim that China sent troops over the border into Russia to get shot in order to rebalance the male - female ratio? Might have been Tapestry?
Completely OT. A producer friend has just moved to Dalian in China. He's just sent me this. I don't know whether anyone's been there but I was expecting something semi-primitive.
6.5 million people and nobody will have heard of it. A friend comes from there. It's one of the better parts of China.
What is amazing about Roger's Dalian video is how many people are as ignorant as him. And I don't mean that pejoratively - I mean educated, clever people who just don't realize how advanced Asia is, and, in particular, China.
There are probably 30-50 cities like Dalian, in China, or there soon will be.
It is going to dominate the world and surpass America very soon, if it hasn't already. I may have opined thusly, before.
Until China is actually
That is not the real issue - China is well on its way to develop a blue water navy and power projection capability.
What is at issue is whether economically China can become a leader rather than just a catcher-upper in economic and scientific issues. And within science, can it do the great quantum leap science, or just the rote filling in the gaps stuff.
I am far less convinced that China is ready to become a leader in any sense other than brute numbers.
It already has the largest military in the world
China invaded Tibet in 1960, fought India (successfully) in 1962 in the Himalayas and invaded Vietnam briefly in 1979.
So it has been involved in no significant conflict for 38 years
Notably all these wars were on the borders, I dont think they aspire to move away from the homeland.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
IIRC, it used to be thought that the one-child policy + preference for male children would eventually lead to the Chinese seeking wives from abroad, and that this seeking might be driven militarily.
Presumably the problem never materialised, or they resolved it some other way.
The combination of computer games, and prostitution mostly, I think.
We are in a weird paradoxal universe. 2 years ago, Labour argued it was unfair millionaires got it and Tories said it was better to be universal, now we have John the Marxist saying millionaires should keep it and Kim Jong May wanting to get it away from them.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazwere airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolute Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
Tuscans aren't...a summer on the beach is ample motivation to stay slim....
True. Northern Italians are so vain - bella figura and all that - the pressure to stay thin supersedes the overwhelming global tendency to blob out, for now. South of Rome, they tend to be more *relaxed*. I liked the way the first series of Gomorrah showed this. Big fat Italian men.
On a more optimistic note, we are probably quite close to solving obesity, and then we can all eat what the F we like, even though no one will have a job.
I don't have a job and have just chomped 6 bags of Walkers cheese and onion crisps...and would happily eat some more if they were around...
Terrible....a month of being back in Blighty and am reduced to this....
I did enjoy them mind....
I recommend a much younger girlfriend, as an antidote. If you may permit. You are forced to stay relatively thin, out of the intense fear they will leave you for some handsome young dude, at any moment.
Sean, clearly young and handsome aren't their priorities....
I've just ordered Google Home for my bedroom, and Amazon Echo for my living room. I'm gonna do a one man Which consumer test.
Anyone got an idea who will win?
Alexa is amazing
Isn't there a movie about a guy who falls in love with the voice of his electronic home assistant? (Given the wealth of literature on the subject, we all know humans are very keen on teaching machine intelligence to love)
She?
Isn't that H. Rider Haggard?
Or am I displaying an unseemly knowledge of Victorian pot-boilers?
I've just ordered Google Home for my bedroom, and Amazon Echo for my living room. I'm gonna do a one man Which consumer test.
Anyone got an idea who will win?
Alexa is amazing
Isn't there a movie about a guy who falls in love with the voice of his electronic home assistant? (Given the wealth of literature on the subject, we all know humans are very keen on teaching machine intelligence to love)
She?
Isn't that H. Rider Haggard?
Or am I displaying an unseemly knowledge of Victorian pot-boilers?
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
Also pre-Islamic Mid-Eastern sects contributed to Arab knowledge.
For instance, Arab astronomer Al-Battani probably had Sabian ancestry, as evidenced by his full name:
Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Jābir ibn Sinān al-Raqqī al-Ḥarrānī aṣ-Ṣābiʾ al-Battānī
The Sabians were noted for their "Pagan religion" and "star idolatory", but were tolerated for several centuries by the Caliphs, until Islam took a more fundamentalist turn by the 13th century. Harran in Turkey was the Sabians' centre, not a million miles from 12,000 year old Gobekli Tepe. It is thought that the Sabians' religious texts were the Hermetica, which found their way into the hands of the Medici clan in 1460, kick-starting the Renaissance...
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
I suspect the white house is all of those things, and more.
I've stayed in a presidential suite at the King David (as a Times travel journo, not a president of America). Not sure if it was that precise suite, but it was pretty amazing.
Awesome views of the Old City.
What is Jerusalem (and Israel in general) like? Did you ever have security concerns?
As a few of my family members (now passed unfortunately) have fought for the IDF, I should really make a point to visit.
Jerusalem is amazwere airport security in Tel Aviv before I flew home with El Al. They didn't approve of where I had stayed.
After
I went back recently and the main change was how much fatter the Israelis had got.
Everyone in the world is fatter than they were 30 years ago. We are an increasingly obese world.
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Absolute Even the French are beginning to get a bit chubby.
Only the Japanese seem immune.
Tuscans aren't...a summer on the beach is ample motivation to stay slim....
True. Northern Italians are so vain - bella figura and all that - the pressure to stay thin supersedes the overwhelming global tendency to blob out, for now. South of Rome, they tend to be more *relaxed*. I liked the way the first series of Gomorrah showed this. Big fat Italian men.
On a more optimistic note, we are probably quite close to solving obesity, and then we can all eat what the F we like, even though no one will have a job.
I don't have a job and have just chomped 6 bags of Walkers cheese and onion crisps...and would happily eat some more if they were around...
Terrible....a month of being back in Blighty and am reduced to this....
I did enjoy them mind....
I recommend a much younger girlfriend, as an antidote. If you may permit. You are forced to stay relatively thin, out of the intense fear they will leave you for some handsome young dude, at any moment.
Thanks for the advice.....after serious thought I'll give it a pass....
I don't know which would be worse for me...a job, or a younger girl?
An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
The expansion of the Moscow metro is also pretty spectacular at the moment. It's understandable why they see the attraction of China as a political model.
To think that China can't innovate like Japan - or the West - you have to believe they are genetically inferior, or culturally crippled. If the Chinese were culturally crippled then the Japanese (with an even more hidebound, hierarchical culture) would be technologically primitive and stuck in the feudal past. Obviously they are not.
Which means you have to fall back on some dodgy genetic argument: Chinese people are racially more regimented and dull and obedient, or somesuch bollocks. If anything, genetics points in the opposite direction: East Asians - especially coastal Chinese, Japanese, Koreans - have a slightly but noticeably higher average IQ than white Europeans.
The idea China can't dominate is just utter bullshit. They just won't dominate in the western way we are used to. They won't invade and conquer like Britain, France, Spain, America (and their language and culture won't export so easily). It's not how they operate. China never needed or wanted an empire, it is an empire in itself.
But economically and geopolitically will China predominate? Oh yes. Yes indeed. The signs are all around us, already.
Not at all, I just don't think that they will have the necessity to innovate, they have an almost unlimited pool of cheap labour coming from the Chinese countryside. Companies have no incentive to invest and increase productivity per worker in that situation. It is the same reason why British industry is so crap at innovating. We have a few world leaders but in reality British business and management is pretty awful, the solution for the last 15 years has been to import more Eastern Europeans to do lowly paid jobs (something that is shown in our supposedly paradoxical low unemployment rate and anaemic pay growth rate).
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
We are in a weird paradoxal universe. 2 years ago, Labour argued it was unfair millionaires got it and Tories said it was better to be universal, now we have John the Marxist saying millionaires should keep it and Kim Jong May wanting to get it away from them.
I know how much we love to talk about China's world domination....There is an interesting guy who does youtube videos about life in China. He is originally from South Africa, but lived there for many years, speaks the language fluently etc etc etc. Some really interesting stuff.
I've just ordered Google Home for my bedroom, and Amazon Echo for my living room. I'm gonna do a one man Which consumer test.
Anyone got an idea who will win?
Alexa is amazing
Isn't there a movie about a guy who falls in love with the voice of his electronic home assistant? (Given the wealth of literature on the subject, we all know humans are very keen on teaching machine intelligence to love)
She?
Isn't that H. Rider Haggard?
Or am I displaying an unseemly knowledge of Victorian pot-boilers?
Yes, and Yes.
At least I've never finished a Georgette Heyer, Mr B!
You need to switch the argument around. How has America benefited from its imperial interventions since the 60s? You can argue that Korea was a necessary victory. But since then, it's mainly been trivial, or wasteful, or catastrophic.
Vietnam was wasteful, Iraq was catastrophic.
America is Britain in about 1900, or 1905. It still rules the world militarily, but others have used the peace it imposed, to get much richer and stronger, and they will soon overtake.
I am not arguing being the world's policeman is a way to get rich but you cannot truly be a global superpower if you do not come at least close to that status and not all US interventions have been disasters, Gulf War 1 for example or Panama and even Afghanistan eventually got rid of Bin Laden. Japan showed itself willing to intervene well beyond its borders in WW2 even if in the wrong way. Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
You can dominate the world by trade. Indeed it is probably the best way. People always need your custom and your goods, they will eagerly seek them out, unlike your troops and drones, which they loathe and abhor.
As America shrinks - relatively - China will be forced to do more global police-work, to secure their trade routes, but I doubt they will ever seek imperial status. And very sensible, too. They will nonetheless be the pre-eminent power, until India or the Martians take over, etc
People buy a lot of Chinese goods because they are cheap, they still tend to go elsewhere for quality and until China is really willing to gets its hands dirty in the Middle East when needed it will not be a true superpower
To think that China can't innovate like Japan - or the West - you have to believe they are genetically inferior, or culturally crippled. If the Chinese were culturally crippled then the Japanese (with an even more hidebound, hierarchical culture) would be technologically primitive and stuck in the feudal past. Obviously they are not.
Which means you have to fall back on some dodgy genetic argument: Chinese people are racially more regimented and dull and obedient, or somesuch bollocks. If anything, genetics points in the opposite direction: East Asians - especially coastal Chinese, Japanese, Koreans - have a slightly but noticeably higher average IQ than white Europeans.
The idea China can't dominate is just utter bullshit. They just won't dominate in the western way we are used to. They won't invade and conquer like Britain, France, Spain, America (and their language and culture won't export so easily). It's not how they operate. China never needed or wanted an empire, it is an empire in itself.
But economically and geopolitically will China predominate? Oh yes. Yes indeed. The signs are all around us, already.
Not at all, I just don't think that they will have the necessity to innovate, they have an almost unlimited pool of cheap labour coming from the Chinese countryside. Companies have no incentive to invest and increase productivity per worker in that situation. It is the same reason why British industry is so crap at innovating. We have a few world leaders but in reality British business and management is pretty awful, the solution for the last 15 years has been to import more Eastern Europeans to do lowly paid jobs (something that is shown in our supposedly paradoxical low unemployment rate and anaemic pay growth rate).
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
Supply of cheap labour is clearly not a sufficient explanation for their success. India has almost as many people but its GDP per capita is 5 times lower.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
Eventually too many people realise that having loads of money and no freedom is shit.
The Scotch aren't grown up and mature enough to handle power yet.
For some unknown reason the adults have given them matches.
It may appear pedantic, Geoff, but it's a pet hate of mine. Scotch is a drink, the people of Scotland are Scottish.
I don't know why it jars with me - I haven't any Scottish blood in me, as far as I know - but it does.
Cheers.
"Scotch" meaning whisky is an Americanism. In GB it is called "whisky". OTOH I think scotch eggs are scotch, not Scottish.
Yes, I knew about scotch/whisky, but its an Americanism that is widely recognised here. Not sure about scotch eggs, or scotch mist for that matter, but no way I'm having Scotch for the people of Scotland!
Quote from Theuniondivvie 1151 yesterday: "The need to avoid the possibility of some ordinary Scotch person being seen to tell Tessy to giruy is positively neurotic."
That's being ironical
It's his strange, Hibernian, sense of humour
I wouldn't cancel afternoon school to bury that little...
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
As China's middle class grows and becomes more educated I am not sure they will tolerate lacking the freedoms of the West, even Singapore has a democracy, just one party tends to win a majority of seats in most elections
To think that China can't innovate like Japan - or the West - you have to believe they are genetically inferior, or culturally crippled. If the Chinese were culturally crippled then the Japanese (with an even more hidebound, hierarchical culture) would be technologically primitive and stuck in the feudal past. Obviously they are not.
Which means you have to fall back on some dodgy genetic argument: Chinese people are racially more regimented and dull and obedient, or somesuch bollocks. If anything, genetics points in the opposite direction: East Asians - especially coastal Chinese, Japanese, Koreans - have a slightly but noticeably higher average IQ than white Europeans.
The idea China can't dominate is just utter bullshit. They just won't dominate in the western way we are used to. They won't invade and conquer like Britain, France, Spain, America (and their language and culture won't export so easily). It's not how they operate. China never needed or wanted an empire, it is an empire in itself.
But economically and geopolitically will China predominate? Oh yes. Yes indeed. The signs are all around us, already.
Not at all, I just don't think that they will have the necessity to innovate, they have an almost unlimited pool of cheap labour coming from the Chinese countryside. Companies have no incentive to invest and increase productivity per worker in that situation. It is the same reason why British industry is so crap at innovating. We have a few world leaders but in reality British business and management is pretty awful, the solution for the last 15 years has been to import more Eastern Europeans to do lowly paid jobs (something that is shown in our supposedly paradoxical low unemployment rate and anaemic pay growth rate).
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
Supply of cheap labour is clearly not a sufficient explanation for their success. India has almost as many people but its GDP per capita is 5 times lower.
@SeanT...if you are horny, and a middle aged man with money and a bit of confidence you can shag for Britain...I have some very good friends who fit that type...
I (sort of) feel sorry for the girls...but they know the score....But, seriously comrade you do not have to brag about it. Could you imagine being cornered at a party by DJT and hearing story upon story about his cockmanship....not pleasant....boring and sad....my stories of chomping down a six pack of Walkers cheese and onions is far more interesting....
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
Also pre-Islamic Mid-Eastern sects contributed to Arab knowledge.
For instance, Arab astronomer Al-Battani probably had Sabian ancestry, as evidenced by his full name:
Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Jābir ibn Sinān al-Raqqī al-Ḥarrānī aṣ-Ṣābiʾ al-Battānī
The Sabians were noted for their "Pagan religion" and "star idolatory", but were tolerated for several centuries by the Caliphs, until Islam took a more fundamentalist turn by the 13th century. Harran in Turkey was the Sabians' centre, not a million miles from 12,000 year old Gobekli Tepe. It is thought that the Sabians' religious texts were the Hermetica, which found their way into the hands of the Medici clan in 1460, kick-starting the Renaissance...
I've been to Harran!!! Nearby Sogmatar, a centre of Sabian paganism and moon-worship and human sacrifice is one of the most intense, unsettling and moodily menacing places on earth.
Me too. It is the site of the battle of Carrhae (53 BC) where Crassus got wiped out by the Parthians.
To think that China can't innovate like Japan - or the West - you have to believe they are genetically inferior, or culturally crippled. If the Chinese were culturally crippled then the Japanese (with an even more hidebound, hierarchical culture) would be technologically primitive and stuck in the feudal past. Obviously they are not.
Which means you have to fall back on some dodgy genetic argument: Chinese people are racially more regimented and dull and obedient, or somesuch bollocks. If anything, genetics points in the opposite direction: East Asians - especially coastal Chinese, Japanese, Koreans - have a slightly but noticeably higher average IQ than white Europeans.
The idea China can't dominate is just utter bullshit. They just won't dominate in the western way we are used to. They won't invade and conquer like Britain, France, Spain, America (and their language and culture won't export so easily). It's not how they operate. China never needed or wanted an empire, it is an empire in itself.
But economically and geopolitically will China predominate? Oh yes. Yes indeed. The signs are all around us, already.
Not at all, I just don't think that they will have the necessity to innovate, they have an almost unlimited pool of cheap labour coming from the Chinese countryside. Companies have no incentive to invest and increase productivity per worker in that situation. It is the same reason why British industry is so crap at innovating. We have a few world leaders but in reality British business and management is pretty awful, the solution for the last 15 years has been to import more Eastern Europeans to do lowly paid jobs (something that is shown in our supposedly paradoxical low unemployment rate and anaemic pay growth rate).
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
Supply of cheap labour is clearly not a sufficient explanation for their success. India has almost as many people but its GDP per capita is 5 times lower.
Where did I say that?
You said that their 'almost unlimited pool of cheap labour' means that they do not have the necessity to innovate.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
Also pre-Islamic Mid-Eastern sects contributed to Arab knowledge.
For instance, Arab astronomer Al-Battani probably had Sabian ancestry, as evidenced by his full name:
Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Jābir ibn Sinān al-Raqqī al-Ḥarrānī aṣ-Ṣābiʾ al-Battānī
The Sabians were noted for their "Pagan religion" and "star idolatory", but were tolerated for several centuries by the Caliphs, until Islam took a more fundamentalist turn by the 13th century. Harran in Turkey was the Sabians' centre, not a million miles from 12,000 year old Gobekli Tepe. It is thought that the Sabians' religious texts were the Hermetica, which found their way into the hands of the Medici clan in 1460, kick-starting the Renaissance...
I've been to Harran!!! Nearby Sogmatar, a centre of Sabian paganism and moon-worship and human sacrifice is one of the most intense, unsettling and moodily menacing places on earth.
I think you said you also visited Gobekli Tepe itself? I only know about it through Graham Hancock's writings, but still a fascinating place. Has one of the earliest representations of Scorpio, on Pillar 43!
Remember in China, no free healthcare, no real pensions, the courts are a disaster, apparently they are as keen to threaten to sue each other in America (except with the winner being who has the most corrupt friends in high places).
I think people might at some point think that stuff like some healthcare and pension might be what they would like, but they are bloody expensive.
You need to switch the argument around. How has America benefited from its imperial interventions since the 60s? You can argue that Korea was a necessary victory. But since then, it's mainly been trivial, or wasteful, or catastrophic.
Vietnam was wasteful, Iraq was catastrophic.
America is Britain in about 1900, or 1905. It still rules the world militarily, but others have used the peace it imposed, to get much richer and stronger, and they will soon overtake.
I am not arguing being the world's policeman is a way to get rich but you cannot truly be a global superpower if you do not come at least close to that status and not all US interventions have been disasters, Gulf War 1 for example or Panama and even Afghanistan eventually got rid of Bin Laden. Japan showed itself willing to intervene well beyond its borders in WW2 even if in the wrong way. Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
You can dominate the world by trade. Indeed it is probably the best way. People always need your custom and your goods, they will eagerly seek them out, unlike your troops and drones, which they loathe and abhor.
As America shrinks - relatively - China will be forced to do more global police-work, to secure their trade routes, but I doubt they will ever seek imperial status. And very sensible, too. They will nonetheless be the pre-eminent power, until India or the Martians take over, etc
Their principal military objectives are to shunt America out of the China Sea and the Bay of Bengal, to keep their trade from being blockaded through the Malacca Strait and so their surrounding area is theirs. They have ambitious programmes for satellite warfare (a byproduct of which is a programme to land a man on the moon) .
To think that China can't innovate like Japan - or the West - you have to believe they are genetically inferior, or culturally crippled. If the Chinese were culturally crippled then the Japanese (with an even more hidebound, hierarchical culture) would be technologically primitive and stuck in the feudal past. Obviously they are not.
Which means you have to fall back on some dodgy genetic argument: Chinese people are racially more regimented and dull and obedient, or somesuch bollocks. If anything, genetics points in the opposite direction: East Asians - especially coastal Chinese, Japanese, Koreans - have a slightly but noticeably higher average IQ than white Europeans.
The idea China can't dominate is just utter bullshit. They just won't dominate in the western way we are used to. They won't invade and conquer like Britain, France, Spain, America (and their language and culture won't export so easily). It's not how they operate. China never needed or wanted an empire, it is an empire in itself.
But economically and geopolitically will China predominate? Oh yes. Yes indeed. The signs are all around us, already.
Not at all, I just don't think that they will have the necessity to innovate, they have an almost unlimited pool of cheap labour coming from the Chinese countryside. Companies have no incentive to invest and increase productivity per worker in that situation. It is the same reason why British industry is so crap at innovating. We have a few world leaders but in reality British business and management is pretty awful, the solution for the last 15 years has been to import more Eastern Europeans to do lowly paid jobs (something that is shown in our supposedly paradoxical low unemployment rate and anaemic pay growth rate).
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
Supply of cheap labour is clearly not a sufficient explanation for their success. India has almost as many people but its GDP per capita is 5 times lower.
Where did I say that?
You said that their 'almost unlimited pool of cheap labour' means that they do not have the necessity to innovate.
But what does that have to do with their general success elsewhere? I didn't make any connection, I'm not sure why you are. But then you are genuinely deluded so I'm not surprised that your reading comprehension is quite poor.
The Scotch aren't grown up and mature enough to handle power yet.
For some unknown reason the adults have given them matches.
It may appear pedantic, Geoff, but it's a pet hate of mine. Scotch is a drink, the people of Scotland are Scottish.
I don't know why it jars with me - I haven't any Scottish blood in me, as far as I know - but it does.
Cheers.
"Scotch" meaning whisky is an Americanism. In GB it is called "whisky". OTOH I think scotch eggs are scotch, not Scottish.
Yes, I knew about scotch/whisky, but its an Americanism that is widely recognised here. Not sure about scotch eggs, or scotch mist for that matter, but no way I'm having Scotch for the people of Scotland!
Quote from Theuniondivvie 1151 yesterday: "The need to avoid the possibility of some ordinary Scotch person being seen to tell Tessy to giruy is positively neurotic."
That's being ironical
It's his strange, Hibernian, sense of humour
I wouldn't cancel afternoon school to bury that little...
Report from the field....visit to Bath today...supposedly a key Tory / Lib Dem marginal....is there an election on? It was hard to tell. A few and I mean a few placards in some gardens (one for the lib dem candidate that stepped down) and that was about it.
According to placards the Greens are apparently going to storm Ledbury, Hefrefordshire....one solitary and hopeless (in the electoral sense) LD poster, No Tory posters,. I am still waiting foR the traditional 3 big UKIP houses in the village to put up their placards. Nothing as yet, which may be some sort of straw in the wind.
Remember in China, no free healthcare, no real pensions, the courts are a disaster, apparently they are as keen to threaten to sue each other in America (except with the winner being who has the most corrupt friends in high places).
I think people might at some point think that stuff like some healthcare and pension might be what they would like, but they are bloody expensive.
Absolutely, eventually the workers will tire of working for peanuts and their kids won't want to do the jobs their parents did (and the parents won't want it either). On the one hand you have urban China which is very smart, wealthy and successful, on the other there is the underclass that urban China is built on the back of. The odd situation in China is that the political powers will dump urban China in anotjer Cultural Revolution to hold onto power as they know it lies with the proles.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
As China's middle class grows and becomes more educated I am not sure they will tolerate lacking the freedoms of the West, even Singapore has a democracy, just one party tends to win a majority of seats in most elections
There is undoubtedly an element of that. Politicians in the better run cities are acutely aware of public opinion. In fact some of the discussions on social care and how to fund it are very similar to what we are seeing in the UK election.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
Eventually too many people realise that having loads of money and no freedom is shit.
People don't crave freedom - they crave security and continuity. That's why Chinese tourists descend on Kidlington (!!!) for a taste of the ancient verities fast disappearing back home:
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
Eventually too many people realise that having loads of money and no freedom is shit.
Do they, though? I genuinely wonder if this is true, any more. I reckon 97.8% of people on earth would be very very very happy to live in Singapore: rich, boring, autocratic, hugely safe, great healthcare, world class shopping, brilliant scuba diving nearby.
I wonder if we in the West over-estimate the appeal of our liberal democratic systems. In the eyes of others.
Singapore does have a democracy though, in the last general election there in 2015 opposition parties won almost 40% in the seats they contested and won seats in the Singapore Parliament even if the PAN still won a large overall majority. That is more than can be said for China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singaporean_general_election,_2015
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
Eventually too many people realise that having loads of money and no freedom is shit.
Do they, though? I genuinely wonder if this is true, any more. I reckon 97.8% of people on earth would be very very very happy to live in Singapore: rich, boring, autocratic, hugely safe, great healthcare, world class shopping, brilliant scuba diving nearby.
I wonder if we in the West over-estimate the appeal of our liberal democratic systems. In the eyes of others.
You realise that Singapore has the vote and it is a proper democracy, right? They even introduced presidential elections because the parliamentary ones were too one sided. The problem(?) in Singapore is that the governing party doesn't fuck up so the opposition doesn't get a look in, not that there's no democracy.
MI5 opened file on Jeremy Corbyn amid concerns over his IRA links
The revelations come as a Telegraph investigation reveals Mr Corbyn’s full links to the IRA, including his support for one of the Balcombe Street gang, who waged a 14-month bombing campaign across south-east England, and his links to the bomb maker believed to have been behind the Hyde Park and Regents Park devices.
Mr Corbyn also shared a platform with a wanted IRA killer and John McDonnell, his shadow Chancellor, claimed that the pair of them used to “pin people against the wall” in the House of Commons to lobby them on behalf of Ireland, can be disclosed.
Go back to the Middle Ages and relations between the Arabs and Europeans. Europe learnt everything from the Arabs: medicine, cartography, mathematics, philosophy, how to build castles, irrigation systems, universities, soft furnishings, puddings, romantic poetry... The Arabs didn't learn a single thing from the Europeans. A couple of centuries later the Europeans dominated the Arabs.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
To be fair, a lot of that knowledge was what the Arabs had learned from classical Greece and Rome, whilst Europe's christians were burning any books they could find from such pagan sources. Once the Arabic world's religion became more closed minded and ours gradually more open minded, things turned around. I don't see an obvious parallel with the modern Chinese.
I disagree. Modern China combines personal competitiveness and generally high although patchy standards of education with very powerful social organisation. An example. Beijing decided to upgrade its subway system to tie in with the Beijing Olympics in 2008. It built 16 subway lines in ten years. How long has the single Crossrail project taken so far? It's not that we don't have subways. The scale is completely different.
We have to face the frightening possibility that China may - I emphasise may - have discovered a better form of political organisation than liberal democracy. And that is: one party, authoritarian, state-directed capitalism.
Singapore pioneered this, and is now perhaps the richest city on earth.
If the Chinese repeat the Singaporean miracle, then all bets are off.
I wonder how many Remainers now wish we had a Chinese/Singaporean system, where the government can simply over-rule the will of the people, if it is deemed unwise.
As China's middle class grows and becomes more educated I am not sure they will tolerate lacking the freedoms of the West, even Singapore has a democracy, just one party tends to win a majority of seats in most elections
There is undoubtedly an element of that. Politicians in the better run cities are acutely aware of public opinion. In fact some of the discussions on social care and how to fund it are very similar to what we are seeing in the UK election.
Indeed, you cannot ignore the general tide of public opinion for too long
Do they, though? I genuinely wonder if this is true, any more. I reckon 97.8% of people on earth would be very very very happy to live in Singapore: rich, boring, autocratic, hugely safe, great healthcare, world class shopping, brilliant scuba diving nearby.
I wonder if we in the West over-estimate the appeal of our liberal democratic systems. In the eyes of others.
Absolutely correct. Most people dont care so long as they are generally left alone if they keep their noses clean and don;t make a fuss and aren't subject to random and capricious state action. ie Singapore. So long as the rules are understood and they know where the lines are, and can do their best within them, even without democracy most people are, in my view, generally content.
Wasn't the deported grandmother that Buzzfeed got all over excited about actually found to be rather keen on living in Singapore rather than Britain for all those years because of a rather nice government subsidized flat?
You don't get those in a China. Instead there are whole ghost towns with nobody living, while the poor and homeless are told not for you.
I was just struck by a thought during my earlier reply...could you imagine the awfulness of having to spend some significant time with Theresa? What could she talk about? Harry Potter or Strong and Stable? Or shoes?</blockquote
she has achieved more than you have or ever will do so i expect there might be the odd interesting conversation.
Personally i find the ideas and thoughts of people with different views to myself quite interesting.
Or are you too bitter and twisted to listen to anyone else's views other than the echo chamber of your comfort zone?
You need to switch the argument around. How has America benefited from its imperial interventions since the 60s? You can argue that Korea was a necessary victory. But since then, it's mainly been trivial, or wasteful, or catastrophic.
Vietnam was wasteful, Iraq was catastrophic.
America is Britain in about 1900, or 1905. It still rules the world militarily, but others have used the peace it imposed, to get much richer and stronger, and they will soon overtake.
I am not arguing being the world's policeman is a way to get rich but you cannot truly be a global superpower if you do not come at least close to that status and not all US interventions have been disasters, Gulf War 1 for example or Panama and even Afghanistan eventually got rid of Bin Laden. Japan showed itself willing to intervene well beyond its borders in WW2 even if in the wrong way. Otherwise China will basically be a giant Switzerland with nuclear weapons
You can dominate the world by trade. Indeed it is probably the best way. People always need
People buy a lot of Chinese goods because they are cheap, they still tend to go elsewhere for quality and until China is really willing to gets its hands dirty in the Middle East when needed it will not be a true superpower
This is simply delusional. You're basically arguing that, until China is ready to get involved in a calamitous, unwinnable imperial Middle East war, it cannot be considered as a superpower.
Have you considered the possibility that China's leaders have looked at recent American history and thought: ooh, no, don;t go there, costs a trillion dollars, and ends in disaster?
Why the F should China invade Kuwait or Iraq or Israel or anywhere? It can dominate through trade. It has no desire to export a political system, like America. Its mindset is entirely different. And it has no Jewish lobby forcing it into unwise wars.
As for the Mid East, China has invested hugely in renewables - where it leads the world. It will soon have no interest in Baghdad - or Jerusalem.
As I said China may lead economically but if it becomes the world no 1 sooner or later ISIS or its successors may well start to turn their attention to its cities too (there are 23 million Muslims in China) and if China does not tackle the problem at source it could soon find it difficult to control
Well of course they have - the Tories have such a lead with them they can take the risk to upset them in the name of good policy, and Labour doing so badly they cannot afford not to be giving freebies to pensioners, as getting those most likely to vote to turn back to them by even a few percent will save many seats.
1. The rate of social change must be a profound psychological challenge to the commonfolk, who were raised in the time of Chairman Mao and the Cultural Revolution. See my comment earlier about tourists in Kidlington.
2. The vast array of public and private wealth portrayed in the video is dependent on fiscal and banking systems that manage to balance private equity and public debt in a perpetually harmonious relationship. Let's hope for all our sakes that they continue to do so.
Press Association estimated declaration times, although usually it's not particularly accurate. Only 3 seats not counting overnight, in Berwick, Wansbeck and Blyth Valley. The last two could be surprisingly close if the local elections are anything to go by.
I've been pondering all evening the Dallian video that Roger posted. Here's the link again for anyone interested:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIvqhhzTBmY
I came to two conclusions:
1. The rate of social change must be a profound psychological challenge to the commonfolk, who were raised in the time of Chairman Mao and the Cultural Revolution. See my comment earlier about tourists in Kidlington.
2. The vast array of public and private wealth portrayed in the video is dependant on a fiscal and banking system that manages to balance private equity and public debt in a perpetually harmonious relationship. Let's hope for all our sakes that it continues to do so.
With that, bon nuit.
The guy I linked below talks a lot about the "forgotten generation" and how they really don't have a clue about modern society and also the cultural idea that because something is free you don't have to take all of it.
He tells a story of the government putting in toilet paper into toilets around more touristy areas and within days all these old folk would arrive early in the morning, empty all the toilet roll into carrier bags and then try and sell it on.
Labour within 10, their best chance for it. They had that with at least one company shortly before the campaign started, so despite the regular 15+ leads it would not be impossible to see it once more off the back of this manifesto, which has been poorly received (which having read all three, is not some disaster, though despite not revealing much costed detail, is the most open about challenges and reducing things), being unpopular for some things on the right and taking away gray vote bribes.
Comments
Possibly 50% of urban Saudi males have type 2 diabetes.
Economic projection is all over africa like a rash.
That's where we are with China and the West now. China has learnt so much from us. We have not learnt a single thing from them.
In the next decades China sneezes and we'll all get a cold.....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBf66wAMpVQ
Also done our PV's today. Local Labour candidate guaranteed 2 votes from this household.
My initial projection, which I'm going to stick to, for the Liberal Democrats is 13; that was based on an assessment of their existing seats plus the most likely available marginals, which implies an approximately neutral position versus the Conservatives (the two parties each losing perhaps three seats to the other,) with the Lib Dems' net gains coming from Labour and the SNP. I really don't see them getting that far, and that's taking into account my assumption that they're doing a little bit better than the polls suggest. If the polls are accurate and they're back to where they started in 2015, then their final seat total could be in single figures again.
Or am I displaying an unseemly knowledge of Victorian pot-boilers?
Terrible....a month of being back in Blighty and am reduced to this....
I did enjoy them mind....
Presumably the problem never materialised, or they resolved it some other way.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-2735332/Venezuela-battles-obesity-amid-dearth-good-food.html
Venezuela rates 60th in the world for obesity in the most recent figures.
We are in a weird paradoxal universe. 2 years ago, Labour argued it was unfair millionaires got it and Tories said it was better to be universal, now we have John the Marxist saying millionaires should keep it and Kim Jong May wanting to get it away from them.
For instance, Arab astronomer Al-Battani probably had Sabian ancestry, as evidenced by his full name:
Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Jābir ibn Sinān al-Raqqī al-Ḥarrānī aṣ-Ṣābiʾ al-Battānī
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Battani
The Sabians were noted for their "Pagan religion" and "star idolatory", but were tolerated for several centuries by the Caliphs, until Islam took a more fundamentalist turn by the 13th century. Harran in Turkey was the Sabians' centre, not a million miles from 12,000 year old Gobekli Tepe. It is thought that the Sabians' religious texts were the Hermetica, which found their way into the hands of the Medici clan in 1460, kick-starting the Renaissance...
I don't know which would be worse for me...a job, or a younger girl?
I didn't say they are incapable of doing so, just that there is no need to do so. Which is why they won't.
Circa 11 million losers
https://www.youtube.com/user/serpentza
He also has some other channels, one where him and a guy from the US ride motorbikes around China and discuss day to day issues.
I (sort of) feel sorry for the girls...but they know the score....But, seriously comrade you do not have to brag about it. Could you imagine being cornered at a party by DJT and hearing story upon story about his cockmanship....not pleasant....boring and sad....my stories of chomping down a six pack of Walkers cheese and onions is far more interesting....
One packet of cheese and onion is enough to make me feel sick nevermind six!!!!!!
And think if the salt that'll be coursing through your veins right around now...
I think people might at some point think that stuff like some healthcare and pension might be what they would like, but they are bloody expensive.
According to placards the Greens are apparently going to storm Ledbury, Hefrefordshire....one solitary and hopeless (in the electoral sense) LD poster, No Tory posters,. I am still waiting foR the traditional 3 big UKIP houses in the village to put up their placards. Nothing as yet, which may be some sort of straw in the wind.
Cons will win with 65%
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-37820663
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singaporean_general_election,_2015
MI5 opened file on Jeremy Corbyn amid concerns over his IRA links
The revelations come as a Telegraph investigation reveals Mr Corbyn’s full links to the IRA, including his support for one of the Balcombe Street gang, who waged a 14-month bombing campaign across south-east England, and his links to the bomb maker believed to have been behind the Hyde Park and Regents Park devices.
Mr Corbyn also shared a platform with a wanted IRA killer and John McDonnell, his shadow Chancellor, claimed that the pair of them used to “pin people against the wall” in the House of Commons to lobby them on behalf of Ireland, can be disclosed.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/19/exclusive-mi5-opened-file-jeremy-corbyn-amid-concerns-ira-links/
Who could possibly be running the Tory GE campaign?
Do they, though? I genuinely wonder if this is true, any more. I reckon 97.8% of people on earth would be very very very happy to live in Singapore: rich, boring, autocratic, hugely safe, great healthcare, world class shopping, brilliant scuba diving nearby.
I wonder if we in the West over-estimate the appeal of our liberal democratic systems. In the eyes of others.
Absolutely correct. Most people dont care so long as they are generally left alone if they keep their noses clean and don;t make a fuss and aren't subject to random and capricious state action. ie Singapore. So long as the rules are understood and they know where the lines are, and can do their best within them, even without democracy most people are, in my view, generally content.
You don't get those in a China. Instead there are whole ghost towns with nobody living, while the poor and homeless are told not for you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIvqhhzTBmY
I came to two conclusions:
1. The rate of social change must be a profound psychological challenge to the commonfolk, who were raised in the time of Chairman Mao and the Cultural Revolution. See my comment earlier about tourists in Kidlington.
2. The vast array of public and private wealth portrayed in the video is dependent on fiscal and banking systems that manage to balance private equity and public debt in a perpetually harmonious relationship. Let's hope for all our sakes that they continue to do so.
With that, bon nuit.
A bit strange it's being shown during an election
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Action_Party
http://election.pressassociation.com/Declaration_times/general_2017_by_time.php
He tells a story of the government putting in toilet paper into toilets around more touristy areas and within days all these old folk would arrive early in the morning, empty all the toilet roll into carrier bags and then try and sell it on.
You can just sense the emerging power in the country