The Time Is Different

My friend, Mark Mykleby, who works in the Pentagon, shared with me this personal letter to the editor he got published last week in his hometown paper, The Beaufort Gazette in South Carolina. It is the best reaction I’ve seen to the BP oil spill — and also the best advice to President Obama on exactly whom to kick you know where.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

“I’d like to join in on the blame game that has come to define our national approach to the ongoing environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. This isn’t BP’s or Transocean’s fault. It’s not the government’s fault. It’s my fault. I’m the one to blame and I’m sorry. It’s my fault because I haven’t digested the world’s in-your-face hints that maybe I ought to think about the future and change the unsustainable way I live my life. If the geopolitical, economic, and technological shifts of the 1990s didn’t do it; if the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 didn’t do it; if the current economic crisis didn’t do it; perhaps this oil spill will be the catalyst for me, as a citizen, to wean myself off of my petroleum-based lifestyle. ‘Citizen’ is the key word. It’s what we do as individuals that count. For those on the left, government regulation will not solve this problem. Government’s role should be to create an environment of opportunity that taps into the innovation and entrepreneurialism that define us as Americans. For those on the right, if you want less government and taxes, then decide what you’ll give up and what you’ll contribute. Here’s the bottom line: If we want to end our oil addiction, we, as citizens, need to pony up: bike to work, plant a garden, do something. So again, the oil spill is my fault. I’m sorry. I haven’t done my part. Now I have to convince my wife to give up her S.U.V. Mark Mykleby.”

I think Mykleby’s letter gets at something very important: We cannot fix what ails America unless we look honestly at our own roles in creating our own problems. We — both parties — created an awful set of incentives that encouraged our best students to go to Wall Street to create crazy financial instruments instead of to Silicon Valley to create new products that improve people’s lives. We — both parties — created massive tax incentives and cheap money to make home mortgages available to people who really didn’t have the means to sustain them. And we — both parties — sent BP out in the gulf to get us as much oil as possible at the cheapest price. (Of course, we expected them to take care, but when you’re drilling for oil beneath 5,000 feet of water, stuff happens.)

As Pogo would say, we have met the enemy and he is us.

But that means we’re also the solution — if we’re serious. Look, we managed to survive 9/11 without letting it destroy our open society or rule of law. We managed to survive the Wall Street crash without letting it destroy our economy. Hopefully, we will survive the BP oil spill without it destroying our coastal ecosystems. But we dare not press our luck.

We have to use this window of opportunity to insulate ourselves as much as possible against all the bad things we cannot control and get serious about fixing the problems that we can control. We need to make our whole country more sustainable. So let’s pass an energy-climate bill that really reduces our dependence on Middle East oil. Let’s pass a financial regulatory reform bill that really reduces the odds of another banking crisis. Let’s get our fiscal house in order, as the economy recovers. And let’s pass an immigration bill that will enable us to attract the world’s top talent and remain the world’s leader in innovation.

We need all the cushions we can get right now, because we are living in a world of cascading and intertwined threats that have the potential to turn our country upside down at any moment. We do not know when the next Times Square bomber might get lucky. We don’t know how long the U.S. and Israel will tolerate Iran’s nuclear program. We don’t know if Pakistan will hold together and what might happen to its nukes. We don’t know when North Korea will go nuts. We don’t know if the European Union can keep financing the debts of Greece, Hungary and Spain — and what financial contagion might be set off if it can’t.

“It is not your imagination,” says corporate strategy consultant Peter Schwartz — there is a lot more scary stuff hanging over the world today. Since the end of the cold war and the rise of the Internet, we’ve lost the walls and the superpowers that together kept the world’s problems more contained. Today, smaller and smaller units can wreak larger and larger havoc — and whatever havoc is wreaked now gets spread faster and farther than ever before.

That is why we have to solve the big problems in our control, not postpone them or pretend that more lobby-driven, lowest-common-denominator solutions are still satisfactory. A crisis is a terrible thing to waste, but a reprieve and a breathing spell — which is what we’re having right now — is a really terrible thing to waste. We don’t want to look back on this moment and say: How could we have gone back to business as usual and petty political gridlocks with all those black swans circling around us? Then we will really kick ourselves.


Okay comrades, this is an article from the famous New York Time columnist Thomas Friedman published digitally on June 11th. As being part of this whole planet, we may just take some responsibilities on making it better. Well, maybe it's your fault as well as mine. right?

The Influence of Facebook

Just a few month before (or some weeks), some employees in a company were found out playing "Happy Farm" on Facebook during work time. From that point, Taiwan society, or some part of the society, starts to ban Facebook.

So here is a news article (repost from Yahoo! Taiwan):

記者王榮祥／高縣報導〕搜尋搶案被害人，facebook幫大忙！

鳳山警方日前逮捕一名機車搶奪嫌犯、順勢破獲縣市許多搶案，但起獲贓物裡有個高級數位相機，嫌犯卻堅持已忘記在哪裡取得，偵查佐林正清最後透過facebook上的個人資料比對照片，幸運找到被害人出面指認。

警方調查，被害人黃姓女子十月初於高市苓雅區遭搶，當時皮包被搶走，裡頭除少數證件，就屬價值三萬多元的數位相機最值錢。

涉案梁姓男子（二十六歲、高縣大寮人、有詐欺前科）十一月初遭鳳山警方逮捕，清查後發現他自十月初即涉及縣、市多起搶案與竊案；梁嫌被捕同時，警方在其住處查獲一些贓物，包括來歷不明的數位相機。

偵查佐林正清檢視相機，發現電池上有疑似被害人的姓名貼紙，索性將姓名輸入網站搜尋，不料查無相關資料。

林正清不死心，回家後打開個人電腦，嘗試進入facebook探詢，果然找到同名同姓女子，經與其連結成好友後，將對方網站照片與相機照片比對，確認就是被搶女子。

林正清怕對方誤會是詐騙集團，先透過網路詢問是否被搶，對方立即有回應，林正清索性表明身分，並將被害人約至警局做筆錄，順利再偵破一起搶案。

林正清事後笑說，我是在家裡開facebook辦案，沒有違反規定。

It seems like normal, or even interesting news; however, if you read carefully, you can sense how Facebook has affected Taiwanese society. Just because most of the people don't like Facebook usage in daytime, the reporter "SPECIFIED" that the policeman used Facebook at home in the last sentence. There is basically nothing wrong with using Facebook, I think everyone should know that.

New York voices on 9/11 trial

One of the criminal of the 9/11 New York WTC incident is currently trialed in Guantanamo Bay, but now he is planned to be moved to jails in New York Ciy. Voices start to rise, and bursts into quarrels.

What's your opinions?

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8359544.stm

Wrong Words?

As I was reading through some news on Yahoo! Taiwan news pages, I saw this really hilarious one. The article shows how careless and ignorant the PRC people are. It also shows how a massive producing process could cause mistakes.

繼中式英文笑掉外界大牙後，大陸標語又出現驚人錯誤。湖南長沙多輛公車標語，竟將「敬業奉獻」，寫成「精液奉獻」。由於「敬業」與「精液」在大陸通用漢語拼音都是「jing ye」，疑為文案打字者輸入時選錯字又未校對，才發生此一笑話。不少男網友說：「精液對全社會奉獻，豈不人人叫你爸爸？」

一名網友燕窩魚近日在天涯社區發文，稱其上月底乘坐九○三路公車時，一不小心發現車上宣傳標語竟出現一明顯錯誤，公民基本道德規範中的「敬業奉獻」，卻寫成「精液奉獻」，並附照片為證，許多網友推測應是拼音出的錯。

此一錯誤還發現在其他路公車，一名網友說，周末與老婆出門，在長沙汽車西站坐九○二公車時，老婆突然問我，公民道德規範什麼時候改了，最後一句居然換成「精液奉獻」。

不少網友繼之發現，長沙九○八東線上也有這樣的標語，同樣將敬業奉獻中的敬業二字寫成精液。

雖然客運公司都強調，他們是直接把登廣告委託人寫好的標語或宣傳語直接貼上，與他們無關，但網友說：「這麼離譜的錯誤，難道公車公司都不處理嗎？」網友揶揄，這應貼在牛郎店，因為他們的敬業方式，就是不斷精液奉獻。


source: http://tw.news.yahoo.com/article/url/d/a/091104/4/1u9ss.html

PARADE OF DEGENERATES

The Taiwan "Pride Parade" takes place this year on October 31. Being quite imaginative, it will start from 凱達格蘭大道, just like all other major parades: http://fridae.com/newsfeatures/2009/10/01/9031.taiwan-pride-parade-oct-31

This just further affirms how liberal "democracy", left unchecked, grows into a tumor. People mark themselves off as "LGBT", mostly because it is trendy and cool. In the "democratic" bourgeois society, almost everyone does things because they are trendy and cool. Oh what irony! Opponents to reason often point out how communism is anti-family. Yet, what has our beloved capitalism brought us? This absurd self-categorization is an inherent characteristic of bourgeois society. What better way to distract the proletariat from the real problem, than to offer them a chance to go to fun and colorful parades?

(The rainbow colors of mental degeneration, staining the streets of Taipei.)

World forecasters follow Taiwan's lead in Lupit forecast

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2009/10/23/229754/World-forecasters.htm

Taiwan was the only country to predit the correct path of Typhoon Lupit. It has went west for the past few days and will switch to go northeast for time in the future. Several other countries such as US and China have been despicably flawed as they said Typhoon Lupit would so west and north west. Japan predicted the typhoon will go North which is a little more accurate.

Technicians say that typhoon predictions are based on current situations as well as experience so predictions may not always be exact. Taiwan, this point in history, has numerous experiences with typhoons and thus has gained the capability to accurately predict future paths, trends, and possibity of typhoons.

Lupit will slow but storms will proceed and rains will pour until after the 25th of October.

"As the Pacific high pressure system dissipates and the storm continues to slow down, it could change course Friday or Saturday and move in a more northerly direction toward Taiwan, the bureau said."

Northeast Taiwan and terrestrial regions of North will be affected at least 130mm of rain a single day.

Taiwan court hears former president's graft appeal

Source: http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2009/10/23/229887/Taiwan-court.htm

Chen Shui-bian, after being detained then senteced to life in lower courts on corruption charges, plans to appeal his case to Taiwan High Court.

A district court sentenced him to life last month on corruption: NTD 3.15 million from special fund and bribes at list 9 million.

Chen and his lawyer argued that Chen is persecuted my Ma's administration and continually denied Chen's wrongdoings.

At times like, this justice is the only thing that can be trusted. And with Taiwan's sophisticated judicial system, no one has the capability to decide except for the experienced judges and hopefully unbiased jury.

Premier Wu Promises No New Taxes for Now

Yesterday, another talk made by our new Premier Wu Deng-Yi was on taxes. He argued that the environmental and green taxes, that have not been proposed yet, should come only gradually.

Since the economic downturn around two years ago, companies are still struggling to stand up, and more taxes would increase the "atomospheric weight" making it harder to rise.

As it may be obviously, small business owners and even individuals are only welcome to tax cuts and deeply detest tax raises, especially taxes, like this time, on petroleum and coal.

After making his point, Wu is a magician: "With Wu's guarantee, the weighted share price index on the stock market managed to make a minor gain of 2.20 points to 7753.52 points."

Head of Legislative Yuan, Wang, sounded nonchalant. He said that the Yuan will only discuss the bill if it is constructive, and when the time is mature

I think that Wu himself has fought many hard battles, and won and lost across the island. Upon being defeated by Hsieh in 3 elections ago on Kaohsiung, he was promoted to secretary. Then, he kept his position as Nantou Legislator. And the first day as Premier, DPP's three whips launched a vulgar verbal revolt on him. Wu himself is to be commended because he himself never gave up.

Campaigning Begins

With the 2009 County Magistrate Elections on the doorsteps of each party's headquarters, both Ma Ying-jeou and Tsai Ing-wen have made great efforts to ensure his or her party's "cleanness, anti-corruption, solidarity, diligence, and unselfish love of the people and land with the aim of winning". This election is actually very crucial because the results of this elections can greatly reflect Ma's administration, almost like a mid-term exams TASers will receive in December as well.

Today Ma went to the Central Advisory Commitee of the KMT. "Ma told the senior party members that the KMT aims to become a decent, clean, and diligent political party with love to the people" and stated that ones who go against voting rules will be punished. The DPP on the other hand called up Tsai and three Legislative Whips to disparage Ma's actions, stating that there had been too many violations since Ma was inauguarated as president of ROC. Tsai also expressed that this victory would lead to more future wins.

Personally, I believe this election would be more of an uphill battle for the KMT because not only has Typhoon Morakot baned Ma's reputation, but are the KMT members also vying for nominations, causing great internal conflict. KMT really needs to settle down its members so it can secure wins. DPP on the other hand, is more on a revival state but still needs to be aware of the plausible hardships that lay ahead.

Source: http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2009/10/19/229154/Campaigning-begins.htm

Chen Claim Rejected

Yesterday, the grand justices in Taipei's high court rejected Chen's claim that the government's action in Chen's corruption were unconstitutional and violated due process. The Countil of Grand Justices ruled that the court's actions were legal and constitutional, said Hsieh Wen-ting, Judicial Yuan Secretary.

It is not at all completely hopeless for Chen. He could still be granted bail as the court said "the severity of the crimes for which a defendant is charged should not be the sole reason to keep him or her in custody".

When the verdict was read out, Chen remained calm and unemotional.

The court replaced Judge Tsai with Judge Chou Shou-Hsuan, who previously ruled Wu's corruption case and senteced her to life. Since the couple's corruption carges were similar, the court decided to have one judge presiding two cases.

The justices have faced a dilemma. Not granting a bail could be too severe, but granting Chen a bail would spring possibility for the infamous the flee the country.

What I think, personally, should happen is that Chen shoud be granted a lighter sentence but do years of community service. This would change him to a good-hearted person and wash off the greases in his greedy mind.

Cross-strait economic pact expected to provide 260,000 local jobs

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/china-taiwan-relations/2009/10/16/228949/Cross-strait-economic.htm

In the dismal midnight of the current economic crisis, two nemisises have once again cooperated to help each other, due to the recent establishment of an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China on Friday, says Wu, our new Premier.

260,000 jobs will be increased and many will recover from previous losses of porcelain, electrical, and towel industries. For the Taiwanese government, Wu has earmarked NTD 35 billion for fund vulnerable businesses.

Council Labor Affairs (CLA) has also proposed many tactics that could help the working class stand up to their feet. Both the unemployed and disabled will receive funding for period of time.

Taiwan plans not to let laborors from China enter Taiwan and contaminate the economy.

Finally, we can see the first good action Ma's premier has took. Before we refer to Wu Deng- Yi as an "old guy" who is good at debate but not good at doing helpful things. Now, he has proved his merit.

12 People Sentenced to Death

There are always conflicts happening in Tibet regarding the issues of Uyghurs and the PRC government. Uyghurs and Tibetans believe that they deserve more freedom and and less unsuitable policies. Finally, people stood up against the government. On July 5th, some citizens, including Uyghurs, Tibetans, and even Hans, assembled a protest and had a fight with the police. PRC government do not allow any political protesting and 200 people were killed on that day; 1700 are wounded. And now, regarding the incident, PRC government has done more to punish those people- 12 people are sentenced to death.

Staying Executions

After the botched lethal injection on Sept. 15 of convicted murderer and rapist Romell Broom, Ohio Governor Ted Strickland has delayed Broom's execution along with those of two other inmates while the state reviews its death-penalty procedures. Technicians tried unsuccessfully for two hours to access Broom's veins before aborting the effort. Death-penalty opponents hope the state will follow others in abolishing the practice.

This is very ironic actually, the Technicians failed to find the veins in Broom's body so they couldn't inject him with the lethal injection that will end his life. And still after two hours, they still couldn't find a vein that will allow the injection, so they postpone the death-penalty date to sometime in the future. This is very sad for Broom, he's like prepared to be killed and they "failed" to kill him, causing him to suffer for a few more days. This is just sad. Too bad since he is a murderer and a rapist.

Source: TIMES magazine (Issue Vol. 147 ,No. 15)

ADMIN NOTE: Smileys do not constitute proper English.

Heavy Rains batter Yilan County Again

Yilan of the Taiwan East is known for its climate instability and constant floods due to typhoons. This time, the typhoon Parma has dislocated many and turned roads into rivers. The convenient Su Hua Expressway is closed down and many farmers are angry because they have to ship their goods down to Kaoshiung first then up to Taipei, increasing the cost of shipping and decreasing the value/quality of their goods.

County Magistrate Lu Guo-hua is seeing his change for re-election by his doorstep and must take immediate action to help the Yilan civilians lest he angers them. Last time in the 2005 County Magistrate elections, KMT replaced Yilan's and Taipei County's green fields with blue skies and hope to keep the skies blue in December.

Source: China Post

New Michael Jackson song released

A brand new song by Michael Jackson was released on the late singer's Web site early Monday. This song had never been heard before and will be in fact the last Michael Jackson song :(. But for unknown reasons, the song's first 45 seconds was leaked to public on the internet. The song will also be played during the end of the to-be-released movie: This Is It (the last rehearsals of Michael Jackson, more like a documentary). The song will be attached into a CD that will be available for sale on October 26.

We all wish Michael Jackson good luck to his next world, and a hero like him is never to be forgotten. Please support the Michael Jackson Foundation by buying the new CD on October 26 in your local stores or online (Itunes pre-order starts today). God Bless Michael Jackson! And God Bless the Art of Music!

開心農場

There is a quite big news about Facebook application in Taiwan these dew days. Three/some people has been playing 開心農場, one of Facebook's most popular application of Taiwan users, while they supposed to work. They got fired, and that brought the issue to the public.

開心農場 is an application, or rather game, for the users to grow/plant crops and manage a farm- to form some kind of business. It has become popular by its nice graphic and mutiple functions, including "stealing". You can steal others' plants (restricted though). As i have heard my Mandarin teacher confirmed that she spent a lot of time playing 開心農場, and other similar applications such as Restaurant City...etc. I realized there would be some issues about the usage of Facebook. Just like I've predicted, people are really fond wiht playing those game and that leads to losing their jobs. So do you think it worth playing it that much?

7 die in Bus Crash in Kaoshiung

On National Freeway No. 3 about 5:30 am, a B-rated bus carrying 27 passengers collided with a pick up truck. 7 died and 7 more were seriously injured. The bus driver, who was heading his tourists to Hsiaoliuchiu, was unaware of hiting the truck until he was notified by his 12-year-old son.

Surprising however, both the bus driver and the pick-up driver were tested under alcohol levels and both passed the alcohol test.

Astonishing, the bus company manager said that the bus driver, surnanmed Chen, worked for the companies for more than 2 years with a good performance record. This accident, nevertheless, costed the company at least 4 million each for each fatality.

The police concluded that the accident was caused by speeding (120km/hr) when buses aren't supposed to drive in speed higher than 90km/hr.

To me, this is very sad

The country could not afford careless bus drivers who cost the lives of many and damaged the health, physically and mentally, of more. Thus, several county's should impose stiffer fines one speeding, especially buses: as they instill that heaviest traffic and most danger out of all vehicles. The bus drivers should also constantly reminded that speeding is unacceptable according to federal law.

Obama: Nobel Peace Prize is 'call to action'

This Friday, President Obama stated that he was "deeply" surprised after receiving the news that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize. He told the press later that he doesn't view this as a recognition to his accomplishment, but rather a "motivation" or some sort that will "encourage" him to "act" more. He won the Nobel Peace Prize after taking office as the president for less than a year. He returned to the discussion with the US chief commander of Afghan the following day of the Prize announcement.


Three words for the Norwegian parliament and Obama: What the ****. I mean what's going on, have we lost the true meaning of the "Nobel Peace Prize"? Why are we giving out world-class prizes to a president that accomplished less than... lets say... what he didn't promised us during his election campaign. During the election, he made over 500 promises, and after nearly 1/4 of his presidential career had gone by, 370 of them were still left untouched, only 47 promises were kept, and even 7 promises broken ( reference: PolitiFact). So what I think he should do is "give back" the Prize to the foundation, and then when he had truly achieved "World Peace", then he will be accepted by the citizen to "earn it back" (by the way, the Nobel Prize Winner receives 1.5 million dollars). Long Live Democracy! Long Live African-Americans! Long Live Humanity!!

Source of Article: CNN

Obama will discuss for more Troops to Afghanistan

According to the white house spokesman, Obama will be discussing the number of troops needed in Afghanistan this Friday. The rise of violence in Afghanistan by the Taliban have let the Obama administration into another major challenge (as this is the 9th year of the war). The highest US commander in Afghanistan called for another 40,000 to put their counterinsurgency tactics into action. Later, he "informally" requested more resources during a talk with Obama last week. But some are saying that he is treating the informal request over the formal needs of more troops. But Obama's spokesman told the press that he was not considering such things and the formal request of more troops will come as first priority. Since the war had started, 865 American soldiers and 570 allied troops were killed in action, and the public support for the war had dropped sharply for the last past two years. "Our troops are waiting for an answer. The Afghan people are waiting. Our enemy, the Taliban, is not waiting" said Republican Ted Poe.

9 years had passed, thousands of soldiers had sacrificed for the country, and still the war is not over yet. And who is this to blame? The answer, the only answer, Bush. Due to the overreaction and unintelligent decisions of the Bush Administration, the citizens of the United States have to clean up the leftovers for them. What the Bush administration should have done instead was to just finish off Iraq and return. The problem with the USA is that they think themselves as the Big Brother, the global police, always telling what the world should do. And then look at their own country now, there's over taxation, racism, high job losses, health care and education failure, and then lastly a series of failed administrations. All the failed decisions results in major impact to the citizens.
So what I seriously suggest Obama to do is just let everything go, let Iraq and Afghan go, let the government there figure out themselves. Due to the great influence of the US, foreign countries also loss numerous lives while fighting alongside with the US troops. It is finally the time for the US to lower their heads and clean-up what they messed up when they started this "Vietnam" war.

Article Via CNN

US Stock: Apple (AAPL) on fire

Anyone tell me what is going on:
As you may know, i am a hard-ass for short term investment. And so i slammed down 800 share and look what i got -> 1336 dollars for gain. I know this will drop sooner or later, but I am just very shocked for my luck.
The reasons I slammed down so much were because this Tuesday, everyone is expecting tech stocks (Nasdaq) to boom high. Next, we know that there is no big risk of buying apple, since their products were selling well throughout the whole year. And the growth in sales in Korea. Lastly, this is a rumor but I trust the source: the new Imac will be available on October 9th, which gives me a nice transition for a bigger boost.

Any more advise of what I should do is appreciated :) ! Cheers!