The first clear pictures of what appears to be a Chinese stealth fighter prototype have been published online ...
... A few experts have suggested that the pictured aircraft is a mock-up, rather than a functioning prototype ...
But many more experts say they believe the pictures and the aircraft are authentic ...
Dang! This wasn't mentioned in the economic textbooks. I'm sure my economics teacher didn't mention this in the theory of comparative advantage! Why not? Specialise, trade, and get bombed! Nobody mentioned the bombing!
Oh, hang on. It's becoming clearer now. This stealth fighter must be what all the experts on China have been talking about ...
In defence of her homeland, China would have the capacity to sustain casualties far beyond that of the US. As a result of such a conflict, the US would be required to withdraw to the western hemisphere. We would be left a defeated ally of a defeated superpower without a friend in our part of the world. There are many who would then regard Australia as a prize...
The decline in American economic power has already begun and cannot be reversed without an economic revolution of which the US is not capable. China's economic rise will continue...
The challenge for Australia is to recognise the reality of this world. To learn to live with a superpower whose overall impact is declining and at the same time to pursue close relationships with a power whose influence will continue to grow...
We don't have to choose between America and China, but America needs to understand that on several issues Australia's national objectives will not coincide with hers.
Fact 1: if the US vacates Asia, there are many who regard Australia as a prize, mainly China. We are so loved in the region that we are "without a friend".
Fact 2: we are strengthening the military of China by trading with it.
Fact 3: free trade is weakening the USA.
Conclusion: free trade is strengthening the arm of those who regard Australia as a prize, and weakening the USA. Ergo, indiscriminate trade is a threat to national security.
Does this make any sense at all, other than in the la la land of ideology where the economics of free trade is a supreme ideal that cannot be questioned?
File under: 3 simple dots which cannot be connected in the pickled and emotion-neutered brain of an ideologue/fatalist/appeaser/progressive/globalist; and the West is in dire need of an "economic revolution".
THE government is deeply pessimistic about Australia's engagement in Afghanistan and officials have described as hopeless the key task of training the Afghan national police.
Despite repeated public assurances that gains are being made in Afghanistan and that long-term success is possible, secret US embassy cables reveal that some of our top diplomats and officials hold grave concerns about the prospect of success in the nine-year war ...
... Rudd told a group of visiting US congressmen ... "the national security establishment in Australia was very pessimistic about the long-term prognosis for Afghanistan".
Mr Rudd also told US politicians that "he supported the Afghan war 'from day one' but confided that 'Afghanistan scares the hell out of me'."
Blind Freddy can see that terrorism exists in the West only because, as Christopher Caldwell puts it: "Western Europe became a multi-ethnic society in a fit of absence of mind". The problem is here, not over there.
It ... must become a part of our national will, to ensure that Islamic law does not come to our own shores, whether by means of violent jihad terrorism ... or through peaceful patterns of migration, such as those that have already Islamized large parts of Europe ...
Rather than continuing to emphasize the democratization of the Muslim Middle East as our key tool in the war on terror, I will henceforth emphasize the prevention of sharia from reaching the West as our key tool in the war on terror ...
... unregulated immigration of peoples from "sharia states" ... If such an influx continues, Islamic law will be accommodated, adopted and even legislated, at least in some jurisdictions, according to majority will. We know this to be true because such a "sharia shift" is already transforming what sociologists call post-Christian Europe into an increasingly Islamic sphere. If we do not want to see such changes here, we must act. Accordingly, I am asking Congress to amend our laws to bar further Islamic immigration, beginning with immigration from sharia states.
Should we be helping sustain a society and government the fundamental laws and customs of which require the execution of people for distributing a negative opinion about Muhammad? Obviously not, since to do so is not only wrong in itself but means supporting a religious system that seeks to subdue us to the same law. What then should we do? Obviously we do not have the ability to modernize or democratize a society ruled by a religion that executes people for expressing opinions.
That's the rational/emotional part of our brains talking. But Big Kev and his transnational progressive cohorts suppress and ruthlessly beat down such prudence, even though it sneaks back in e.g. the government's own defence white paper:
... the white paper states of violent jihadism: "The scale of the problem will continue to depend on factors such as the size and make-up of local Muslim populations, including their ethnic and-or migrant origins, their geographical distribution and the success or otherwise of their integration into their host society."
This is a statement of the obvious but it is normally not allowed to be said. It begs the question: is it necessary for a liberal Western society to encourage immigration from predominantly Muslim countries with histories of significant minority support for extremism, when it is obvious such immigration will lead to big problems?
But do we then stop Muslim immigration and contain the spread of our local Muslim population? Nope, the ideological/groupthink side of the brain just keeps on trucking as if nothing is wrong. It keeps on banging its head against the same brick wall: non-discrimination and democracy, always and everywhere, must prevail.
Here's some repressed memory therapy for Big Kev and his tormented cohorts:
Step 1: you have an identity, let it out; you have a race, protect it; you have a country, love it.
Step 2: not all religions are peaceful, say it; Mohammed was a terrorist, say it; the Koran is a declaration of war, say it; stopping Muslim immigration is right, know it.
Step 3: breath, cry; know that you have discriminated and know that it is good and necessary.
Step 4: your dream of replacing 'Spanky Banky' as UN Secretary General is over, let it go.
Step 5: Watch these videos by Robert Spencer about the futility of dealing with Islam without confronting uncomfortable truths (skip to 5:30 in the first video).
Step 6: your bill for this consultation is $200
File under: Boo! Ideology is one scary ride, eh? ... It's no wonder that ideologues never sleep.
Everything Spencer says is good. At the same time, he frustratingly leaves the discussion where he always leaves it: with the enormous obstacles in the way of Islamic reform, and--nevertheless--the lingering hope that these obstacles can somehow be overcome. He seems to feel that he must end on that hopeful note, in order to show that he is not--as his liberal critics including Dr. Peterson accuse him of being--an extremist who simply treats Islam as an enemy. He never boils down the problem to its essentials and clearly says:
In all likelihood, Islamic reform is never going to occur, and even if, against all the odds, it occurs at some point, it is not occurring now and may not occur for decades or centuries. What, then, do we, Islam's intended targets, DO about the REALITY of currently unreformed and most likely never-to-be-reformed Islam?
Just as Islam remains what it has always been, Spencer remains what he has always been: a superb explainer of the Islam threat, who declines to address seriously what should be done about this threat, and thus leaves his listeners intellectually and practically helpless before it.
Rudd's unsolicited enthusiasm ''to deploy force if everything goes wrong'' and his willingness to posit Australia directly against China's growing military capability seems unnecessary, given the vast gap between Australian and Chinese capability. It also seems short-sighted given how tightly our economies and people are intertwined. Australia should not be signalling to Washington, let alone Beijing, that it ranks China closer to an enemy than friend, given what is at stake if that favour is repaid.
Question for John Garnaut: why are we financing China's military rise with trade if their peacefulness is so fickle that war can be ignited with a stray word from us? Why are you so willing to recklessly gamble our national security on such a random state of affairs?
Answer: because questioning trade with China now would make the entire journalist and political class look like profound morons for leading us to such an insane state of affairs. So they all just shut up and hope the public doesn't notice that our leadership is totally nuts. Completely bonkers.
Question: after Rudd's Wikileak, how many journalists questioned the wisdom of trading with China? None. Why?
Answer: because 99% of journalists and politicians are braindead and emotion-neutered tagalongs on the conga line of junkies shooting black coal into their veins and getting high sniffing coal seam gas. They're so freakin high they get jittery whenever someone mentions cutting off trade with China.
File under: words can tame lions, or enrage them, so be careful what you say. But don't be alarmed, keep feeding the lion anyway. Now, where's my stash of coal, man? *sniff*
So Kevin Rudd’s been musing about the Chinese and how we might need to be ready to “deploy force” if efforts to integrate the PRC into the rest of the world go horribly wrong...
... it would be good to know what’s fueling Rudd’s “brutal realism” on China, and what exactly he means by everything going wrong when he says: “while also preparing to deploy force if everything goes wrong.” Does the foreign minister seriously think we might need to use military force against China?
Rudd knows that trading with China is based on a gamble. A gamble that China will liberalise into democracy before it gains military supremacy over the USA.
"I am acutely conscious of what happens when you simply allow things to drift to unrestrained nationalism," Rudd told TIME. "[I want to] avoid long-term strategic drift, avoid the possibility of America drifting away from Asia."
It's the unrestrained nationalism of China that is the long-term worry. The nationalism in Western countries has been moderated by the horror of recent wars and a liberal culture. But what moderating force will hold back China when their military gets big enough to do what they want? Nothing. There are no such reigns on China: no post traumatic war stress, no guilt over imperialism, racism or slavery. And do you think China welcomes a liberal culture that has weakened the West with an identity crisis? Nope, on the contrary, they see homogeneity as a strength. So there will be nothing to stop their nationalism tripping over into empathy-free indulgent imperial opportunism at the point of a gun.
Rudd knows all that. But his diplomatic-superman-complex dreams of smothering China in a wave of transnational love, connections and regional groupthink, so much that it will collapse into liberal democracy. Rudd is a high stakes gambler. He knows it could all go wrong and the worst case scenario arises: that we simply fed the tiger until it broke off its leash.
The diplomatic-superman's brain cannot contemplate the prudent solution i.e. simply stop trading with China. Nope, the diplomatic-superman's brain is chockablock full of the 'age of globalisation of everything' ideology. No room in his brain to contemplate 'regressive' protectionism or trade sanctions. Progressivism means never looking back, no matter where the groupthink of the day may lead.
File under: trade with China is a matter of national security; vote for Donald Trump; and Kevin Rudd has a gambling problem.
The US Secretary of State also claimed that any strategic bet on China is a punt on a geopolitical uncertainty - the future stability and continuity of China: "There's no doubt about its economic success. But any fair reading of history would argue that unless that economic success is matched by growing political space and openness, there are going to a lot of tensions within China that will have to be dealt with.''
The Gillard government has decided that it agrees with Clinton. The two countries concur that the best chance of avoiding a major clash with China is not to yield to its new assertiveness, but to strengthen the network of alliances to better temper its demands.
Bzzz! Politician and journalist fail. So long as we continue to support China's economic and military rise by trading with it, we are strengthening China's arm. Non-yielding assertive posturing is a bugger-all brainless left-hand policy if it refuses to acknowledge the right-hand which is feeding the monster. But what else do you expect from ideologues other than denial of reality?
But at least there is some acknowledgement of the rising menace ...
Mrs Clinton squarely confronted the question of whether Australia should reassess its American alliance to give greater weight to a fast-rising China.
"I think that the core values of the Australian people, the quality of life, the standard of living, the aspirations that Australians feel are very much in line with the way Americans think and act," she said in Melbourne yesterday.
"So our relationship is essential to both of us. That doesn't mean we won't have relationships with others, but it does mean that this will remain the core partnership.
"And it is important to recognise that just because you increase your trade with China or your diplomatic exchanges with China, China has a long way to go in demonstrating its interest in being - and its ability to become - a responsible stakeholder.
Alas, there are those who are ready to ditch the alliance.
... China is already strong enough economically to challenge American power in Asia, it is already acquiring the military and diplomatic muscle to compete directly for leadership, and it is showing its determination to do so...
China's rise presents the US with a serious challenge to its leadership of Asia for the first time in decades, and presents Australia with an impossible choice between our traditional alliance and our economic future. The two allies are as a result pulling further apart. Washington wants Australia to help resist China's challenge by increasing military and diplomatic co-operation, while Canberra just wants to avoid taking sides between our major ally and our major trading partner.
The result is an alliance that, despite the warm words, is rapidly losing strategic and political coherence...
The more the rest of us try to constrain China, the more disruptive it will become.
So we should be asking the US to strike a delicate balance, playing a strong role in Asia while allowing China scope to satisfy its legitimate aspirations for more influence. We have to be careful not to appease aggression, but we must also be sure we do not incite aggression by refusing to accommodate legitimate ambition. This will not be easy, but a peaceful future for Asia, and for Australia, depends perhaps more than anything else on the US getting this balance right.
... there are real risks that it would become out of control, with serious danger of war... Australia would find itself forced to choose whether to follow the US into an increasingly intense strategic competition with China, or abandon the alliance.
So we keep supporting the rise of China with our trade, only we're going to pull a magical diplomatic solution out of our proverbial to calm the monster we have created? I'd say that's a solution definitely lacking "coherence".
And finally we come to biggest ideologue of them all: Big Kev. When there are only two clear choices ahead, you can count on the ideologue to concoct a magical "third way".
TONY JONES: Now, you've talked recently about a third way of dealing with China that involves neither conflict nor kowtowing. What do you mean exactly by that?
KEVIN RUDD: What I mean, Tony, is that for many, many years now, the debate in Western countries in particular, and to some extent even within China itself, has said that there's only two ways of approaching the rise of this great power.
One is that we're in some sort of incipient or emerging conflict with China, and the other is the only way forward is to kowtow, in other words to comply with everything China says.
I don't think either of those paths is productive. I think there is a rational third way to proceed, and I believe that can be done through a comprehensive political and economic relationship where we agree on our common interests, both in the region, both at a world stage and bilaterally as well, but also not walking away from those areas in which we disagree.
I think that's the right and rational way to proceed, rather than having this simple, black/white alternative which frankly doesn't lend itself to the great complexity that is modern China.
KEVIN RUDD, FOREIGN MINISTER: ... the Asia Pacific region, which is in a state of huge change. Yes, we do have the rise of China, and we to have of course burgeoning military expenditures in many other countries in the region. So one of the things that we engage in is: how do you build for the future a stable, rules-based order for East Asia and the Pacific for this 21st Century? That's one of the things that we engaged in substantively during these discussions in Melbourne...
I think it's important that we're all contributors to the regional and global order. China has come from being an impoverished state 30 years or so ago to being one of this region's great powers and is on track to become a global great power. Therefore, it's entirely right that the Americans, ourselves and others talk about how these rising powers, including India, contribute to a regional and global rules-based order. And the reason is that provides the stability for the future, and that strategic stability then makes economic growth and jobs possible as well. So therefore, this is not specifically targeted at the PRC; it's targeted at the region as a whole, and that's what we're in the business of doing with our American friends...
Foreign policy is looking ahead and seeing where we're likely to be in a decade's time, and how do we make appropriate preparations? If we look at this region of ours, it's replete with strategic uncertainty. Why? Here, unlike in Europe, we've outstanding territorial disputes - on the Korean Peninsula, in the East China Sea, in the South China Sea and going further round to India of course in Kashmir. So you ask: why are we so keen on developing a rules-based order which enables us to have confidence in security building measures among us, greater predictability of military budgeting, military exercising and the like? It's because this region is much rawer - or much more raw - whatever the correct English is - than is the case in Europe. Therefore, we've got a whole lot of building to do. That's why we've been such strong supporters of this concept of an Asia Pacific community, which now has its form and shape through the East Asia Summit. We've gotta develop its agenda and establish those rules. We don't want conflict in our region.
... therefore the idea of some zero sum game, head to Washington or head to Beijing, is frankly nonsense. That's not the way in which you conduct a foreign policy of a robust, independent and proud state such as ours, Australia.
... we believe therefore that by enhancing the dialogue one-on-one with the Chinese, but also regionally, through this emerging institution, the East Asian Summit, we can obtain greater predictability, greater consistency and we believe greater stability in terms of military operations within the region. As I said before, right now, it's all a bit brittle. We've not had these sort of institutions on the political and security front. Our job now as builders of the region's architecture is to get that right, and that includes with our friends in China as well.
Awww, that's so nice. A rules-based order sounds so strong, when now there is only brittleness. Kevin is so nice, he must be right. No need to change our suicidal trade policy which is feeding a monster. No, the monster will follow the rules. No, really. Kevin said it so articulately it must be true. He speaks Mandarin, so he must be right.
Here is the great ideologue denying our suicidal trade policy and pulling a magical third-way out of his proverbial.
File under: relax, the suicidal ideology of indiscriminate trade comes equipped with magical solutions which can be pulled from the proverbial at the last minute to calm any monsters that we may have blindly created in full view and plain sight because (a) the ideology of free trade is never wrong and (b) bullies just need more love and time to develop and (c) a rules-based order will fix everything anyway and (d) the mindless groupthink that will come with the Asia-Pacific Community will put everyone to sleep and herald an open-borders nirvana just like the EU, just wait, you'll see.
The Chinese have just made a serious strategic blunder.
They dropped the mask and showed their scowling face to Asia, exposing how the Middle Kingdom intends to deal with smaller powers, now that she is the largest military and economic force in Asia and second largest on earth.
A fortnight ago, a Chinese trawler rammed a Japanese patrol boat in the Senkaku Islands, administered by Japan but also claimed by China. Tokyo released the ship and crew, but held the captain...
Now Beijing has decided to rub Japan's nose in her humiliation by demanding a full apology and compensation.
Suddenly, the world sees, no longer as through a glass darkly, the China that has emerged from a quarter century of American indulgence, patronage and tutelage since Tiananmen Square.
The Chinese tiger is all grown up, and it's not cuddly anymore.
And with Beijing's threat to use its monopoly of rare-earth materials to bend nations to its will, how does the Milton Friedmanite free-trade ideology of the Republican Party, which fed Beijing $2 trillion in trade surpluses at America's expense over two decades, look now?
How do all those lockstep Republican votes for Most Favored Nation status for Beijing, ushering her into the World Trade Organization and looking the other way as China dumped into our markets, thieved our technology and carted off our factories look today?
The self-sufficient Republic that could stand alone in the world is more dependent than Japan on China for rare-earth elements vital to our industries, for the necessities of our daily life, and for the loans to finance our massive trade and budget deficits.
How does the interdependence of nations in a global economy look now, compared to the independence American patriots from Alexander Hamilton to Calvin Coolidge guaranteed to us, that enabled us to win World War II in Europe and the Pacific in less than four years?
Yet China's bullying of Japan is beneficial, for it may wake us up to the world as it is, as it has been, and ever shall be...
How should America respond?
As none of these territorial disputes involves our vital interests, we should stay out and let free Asia get a good close look at the new China.
Then explore the depths of our own dependency on this bellicose Beijing and determine how to restore our economic independence.
Ending the trade deficit with China now becomes a matter of national security.
So, while Greg Sheridan is painting a rosy picture of the US not surrendering an inch of the South China Sea, Buchanan demonstrates the Yanks could easily just let it go.
Sheridan should return to questioning the wisdom of trading with China.
This is not that China is planning to go to war with the US, but that it is planning to compromise and degrade US strategic supremacy in the Asia-Pacific. That, certainly, is a long-term trend in the US-China relationship.
As these trends mature, it is unclear if the US will decide that continuing to make China rich is in its own national interests. The US-China relationship is going to become more complicated. Those many pro-China voices in the Australian debate, especially those at the Australian National University, have no answer to why accommodating China on all points, which seems to be their policy, would produce a good outcome for Australia.
Many commentators wrongly say Australian wealth is dependent on China and therefore we must forgo our principles in order to make money. This is not true. The Chinese economy is at least as dependent on Australian commodities as we are on Chinese customers. The Chinese will buy commodities on the basis of price and reliability. The political dimension makes very little difference to that trade. And if they did go somewhere else that would chew up other suppliers and thereby leave other customers for us, of which there are many.
The bellicosity and arrogance of the Beijing government are very difficult to deal with at the moment...
... there are serious signs that the US is reconsidering its policy of taking as many exports as China can dump on it.
There are going to be a lot of headaches in Australia-China relations over the next few years...
File under: the ideology of indiscriminate trade is now a matter of national security.
In a rare glimpse at the threat the military faces from cyber espionage, figures from the Defence Signals Directorate show the military has experienced 700 attempts a month this year, up from 200 a month last year...
And while Defence will not specify who is behind the intrusions - given the anonymity of the web it is often impossible - there has been a wealth of evidence to indicate dozens of countries are prying...
Numerous countries have used the web for espionage, and China, Russia and North Korea have become particularly adept.
The brain-dead ideology of indiscriminate trade empowers China and puts us at a comparative military disadvantage, negating any economic benefit from cheap Chinese imports. But, alas, the ideology of free trade cannot be criticised. Why not? Shut up, you fool, it just can't! Alas, trade sanctions against China cannot be considered. Why not? Shut up! Free trade solves everything. It's warm and fuzzy. Just shut up!
All ye who enter ideology, leave thy brains at the door. Greg Rudd is waiting to reassure you that China is not the enemy, they're just different.
If a butterfly flaps its wings inside the empty brain of an ideologue, our military faces a huge cyber threat.
60 Minutes video story Firepower about the monster we are financing with our brain-dead trade policies.
PROFESSOR HUGH WHITE: As Asia changes, all kinds of bets are off. China has increased very sharply its capacity to sink American ships. And, if we see the US and China going head to head in Asia, then the fact that China's got a lot more power than it used to have could make a real difference to Australia and we could find ourselves being drawn in.
MICHAEL USHER: Former government defence advisor Professor Hugh White points out that while the world's focus has been on terrorism, China has been quietly building its maritime might.
PROFESSOR HUGH WHITE: It's been very common for Americans to say that the biggest threat to America's place in the world is posed by a bloke in a cave. Whereas I would say that the biggest challenge to America's place in the world has been posed by the fact that the world's most populous country has been growing at 7,8,9% per annum year after year after year, and a country that is not content to accept American leadership indefinitely.
File under: and not one mention of the brain-dead and emotionally-neutered ideology of non-discriminatory trade that builds China's war machine with our money and minerals.
SEN LAM: Does the title of your paper, "Sweet and Sour" succinctly describes Australia's ambivalence towards China?
SHEARER: I think it does... What we found in the Lowy Institute's 2010 poll on Australian public attitudes towards foreign policy issues was ... while three quarters of Australians recognise that China's growth is a good thing for Australia, we found ... 70 percent of Australians think that China aims to dominate Asia... and ... almost half of Australians, 46 percent think that there is a likelihood of Australia being attacked militarily by China in the next 20 years.
LAM: Well, that last finding seems to me quite a startling revelation. Did that surprise you as well?
SHEARER; It did Sen, but what I think it reflects is a deeper underlying reality, for something like 200 years now, Australia's strategic interests and our economic interests have run along in parallel. Our major trading partner has always been, either our major security provider or an ally of our major security provider, so first the UK, then for a long time the United States and more recently, Japan. What we're seeing now is profoundly different. China has overtaken Japan as our leading trading partner, but China is a strategic competitor of the United States, our ally ...
LAM: ... Now as the relationship grows in importance, do you think it might also become far more complex and challenging?
SHEARER: I think that is undoubted... I think the divergence between our economic interests and our strategic interest is going to grow. I think that's going to require a very deft management by Australia's next government and that is why I think it is so important that the next government puts in place a durable framework which makes clear that we want to expand our commercial ties with China, while at the same time being absolutely clear that we want to maintain our strategic links with the United States. And that we are not going to compromise our values on questions such as human rights.
Shearer calls for deft management with clear and uncompromising dealings with China. Yeah, that'll stop them. They'll be trembling in their boots. Not. Shearer acknowledges that for 200 years our economic and strategic interests ran in parallel. Does he consider moving back towards that proven security? Nope, that part of his brain doesn't work: suppressed by the ideology of globalisation. He wants to maintain our strategic links with the US, but does he consider the demographic decline of white America puts our alliance at risk once it loses its white identity? Nope, that part of his brain is suppressed by the ideology of diversity. So it's full steam ahead to expand our commercial ties with China because those ideologies cannot be criticised. That's nuts. Making China rich is not in the US' national interest and therefore not in ours. Hence we should be reducing our commerical ties with China, not expanding.
So many of our intellectuals are really fatalistic commentators i.e. they comment passively on the passing scene with a dash of added rhetoric about tightening the reigns to give the facade of being in control when really they are complicit passengers on the sinking ship of ideology.
BY the middle of this century, an Australia with today's population of 22 million would have an increasingly precarious hold on a vast continent.
It would be the envy of others.
China, India and possibly Indonesia would have become wealthier and even more populous, each of them having the latest military hardware that would dwarf Australia's capability.
More ominous would be the relative decline of the US as our protector in the Asia-Pacific region, the result of catch-up by these new powers and its own economic malaise that began with the financial crisis of 2008...
It seems hardly plausible that a tiny population of 22 million would be able to hang on to such an enormous natural resource bounty in the face of inexorably rising demand and increasingly muscular military might.
Without a substantially bigger economy and population, Australians could well lose the lot...
The call by Dick Smith and others for a policy of zero population growth is incredibly reckless when thought of in strategic terms...
Gee. And not a word of criticism for the self-harming ideologies that are causing our economic and military decline i.e. free trade, globalisation, diversity. No acknowledgement that we were safer when we were protectionist, or trading only with our allies. No acknowledgement that our alliances were more secure when we shared a common identity. No, those ideologies are beyond criticism, and that part of Paul Cleary's brain is compartmentalised and suppressed with every morning coffee. No, his left hand never sees what his right hand does. He doesn't deal with cause and effect, only effects. He doesn't deal with action and reaction, just reaction. Fatalism is the new drug, man. Nope, it's full steam ahead to finance the rise of China, India and Indonesia who are (apparently) inherently antagonistic towards us. Well then, goose stepping along with the globalisation cult to our own demise it is then. I'm inclined to call such stupidity "incredibly reckless when thought of in strategic terms" but that would be a tad cruel. The poor journalist would lose his job if he dared question the "great" ideologies of our time. Not to worry, a big country can fix a suicidal ideology, eh? Yeah, sure.
The first clear pictures of what appears to be a Chinese stealth fighter prototype have been published online ...
File under: comparative advantage fail.
