China to allow U.S. carrier into Hong Kong after all

Looks like things are starting to get a little testy between us and China, I hope the military is preparing for a confrontation with China because it looks like they are getting ready for one.

China refused permission for a U.S. aircraft carrier and accompanying vessels to visit Hong Kong for a long-planned Thanksgiving holiday visit -- and then changed its mind.

The USS Kitty Hawk group and its crew of 8,000 airmen and sailors had been expected in Hong Kong on Wednesday, but the U.S. State Department said the visit had been blocked by China.

Hundred of relatives of crew members of the Kitty Hawk had flown to Hong Kong to celebrate Thanksgiving. Hong Kong, especially its Wanchai bar district, has been a regular port of call for U.S. sailors on "R & R" (rest and recuperation) since the Vietnam War.



[...]

He did not say why the ships had been blocked in the first place, but there are issues that may have prompted Beijing's action including U.S. plans to sell Taiwan a $940 million upgrade to its missile system and last month's meeting between U.S. President George W. Bush and the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Buddhist leader who Beijing considers a traitor.

(via)

Atheist China Vows to Encourage Religion

Not buying it. China, one of the main persecutors of Christians, promises to make religious services available during the Olympic Games. Probably in one of their state run churches.

China has promised to offer religious services to foreigners at the 2008 Olympic Games and to have religion play a positive role in the future of the officially atheist country, the top religious affairs official said Wednesday.

A large number of religious athletes and tourists are expected at the Games and Beijing will “make sure” their religious needs are met, Ye Xiaowen, director-general of the State Administration for Religious Affairs, said to reporters at the ruling Communist Party’s 17th Congress, according to Reuters.

“Here I can promise that religious services we offer will not be lower than the level of any previous Games,” Ye said. He did not say, however, if China will allow proselytizing like other Olympic hosts.

Ye also urged the Vatican to establish diplomatic ties with China, where there are some 10 million Catholics either in state-approved churches or “underground” churches.

Catholics in state-approved church respect the Pope as a spiritual figurehead but do not recognize his authority as those in the “underground” church do.

Since 1949, China has not had diplomatic relations with the Vatican following the Communist revolution. There has been significant tension between the two powers because of differences on issues such as the authority to appoint bishops, the recognition of the pope, and the Vatican’s relationship with Taiwan.

[...]

Chinese religious affairs head Ye also dismissed accusations that China restricts the printing and sales of Bibles, saying the Bible is only distributed through [state-run] churches and not through bookshops.

They make them available in the state run churches because they want to control the distribution.

Homeland Security computers hacked

Our government in action:

Hackers compromised dozens of Department of Homeland Security computers, moving sensitive information to Chinese-language Web sites, congressional investigators said Monday.

Investigators pointed a finger at a government contractor, saying the firm hired to protect DHS computers tried to hide the incidents from the department.

The FBI is investigating the incidents, a congressional staffer said, and two members of Congress have asked the department's inspector general to also launch an investigation.

"The results of our [committee] investigation suggest that the department is the victim not only of cyber attacks initiated by foreign entities, but of incompetent and possibly illegal activity by the contractor charged with maintaining security on its networks," Democratic Reps. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi and James Langevin of Rhode Island said in a written statement.

The lawmakers said committee investigators found dozens of DHS computers were compromised and the incidents "were not noticed until months after the initial attacks."

The extent of the damage is unclear, but a House Homeland Security Committee staff member said the hackers "took significant amounts of information."

Don't you feel safer now?

Another Mattel Toy Recall

I think it might be time for either parents to stop buying Mattel toys or Mattel to stop making toys in China:

The world's biggest toymaker, Mattel, has announced its third major recall of Chinese-made products in a month.
About three-quarters of a million toys are being recalled because they are decorated with paint containing too much lead, the US company said.

They include Barbie doll accessories and toy trains.

Mattel chairman Bob Eckert apologised again, but stressed the faults had come to light because the company had recently introduced enhanced testing.

[...]

The first two Mattel recalls included Chinese-made Sarge die-cast toys from the Pixar film Cars, as well as some toys including Polly Pocket, which contained small magnets that could come loose.

This seems appropriate:

After watching the video it makes me so glad that my kids missed the whole Dora the Explorer experience. It's bad enough that we had to go through the Barney phase. (When Sarah was a little baby I took her to the mall and watched as a crowd of kids practically worshiped a man in a purple dinosaur costume. I asked a woman standing next to me who was that and she turned, looked at my baby and then at me and said, "That's Barney, you'll be learning about him soon enough." And she turned out to be a prophet of doom. It all gave me a new appreciation for the alt.barney.dinosaur.die.die.die news group)

Chinese children spent their summer on the Internet?

Notice the sample size:

The vast majority of Chinese schoolchildren chose to stay home and surf the Internet during the summer holidays rather than play outside, state media said on Tuesday, citing a survey.

The poll of 103 children aged 4 to 14 found that just 4 percent chose to do outdoor activities during the holidays and only 9 percent took part in summer educational camps.

[...]

"Five years ago, when the Internet was not so popular among students, they preferred going out during summer holidays. Nowadays they prefer to stay at home and play Internet games," a medical official was quoted as saying by the China

Sounds like Samantha!

Taliban using Chinese weapons

It appears that the Chinese are providing the Taliban with sophisticated weapons possibly through Iran:

Britain has privately complained to Beijing that Chinese-made weapons are being used by the Taleban to attack British troops in Afghanistan.

The BBC has been told that on several occasions Chinese arms have been recovered after attacks on British and American troops by Afghan insurgents.

The authorities in Beijing have promised to carry out an investigation.

This appears to be the first time Britain has asked China how its arms are ending up with the Taleban.

[...]

Afghan officials have also privately confirmed to the BBC that sophisticated Chinese weapons are now in the hands of the Taleban.

They said these included Chinese-made surface-to-air missiles, anti-aircraft guns, landmines, rocket-propelled grenades and components for roadside bombs.

[...]

The Afghan government considers China to be a friend, and a much less meddlesome ally than the other big player in its neighbourhood, India.

But, the counter-terrorism official added, "China is worried about the presence of the US in the region".

[...]

So instead of Pakistan being the transit point for these weapons, the finger is being pointed by many commentators towards Iran.

The Afghan government has long acknowledged privately that Iranian intelligence agencies have been active in southern Afghanistan post-9/11.

Iran has been pursuing a policy of building up proxy networks to be able to attack American forces in response to any US attacks against Teheran's nuclear infrastructure.

[...]

Unnamed US officials have recently been quoted as saying that China has been selling arms to Iran which Iran is then passing on to insurgent groups in Afghanistan and Iraq.

China hacked the Pentagon's network

I think it's time we get some of our American hackers to return the favor. Maybe plant a couple viruses. And do it anonymously from a zombie computer.

The Chinese military hacked into a Pentagon computer network in June in the most successful cyber attack on the US defence department, say American ­officials.

The Pentagon acknowledged shutting down part of a computer system serving the office of Robert Gates, defence secretary, but declined to say who it believed was behind the attack.

Current and former officials have told the Financial Times an internal investigation has revealed that the incursion came from the People’s Liberation Army.

One senior US official said the Pentagon had pinpointed the exact origins of the attack. Another person familiar with the event said there was a “very high level of confidence...trending towards total certainty” that the PLA was responsible. The defence ministry in Beijing declined to comment on Monday.

Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor, raised reports of Chinese infiltration of German government computers with Wen Jiabao, China’s premier, in a visit to Beijing, after which the Chinese foreign ministry said the government opposed and forbade “any criminal acts undermining computer systems, including hacking”.

(via)

Yeah, that's believable.

Tags: hackers

Toys "R" Us recalls crayon and paint sets made in China

More recalls due to lead:

Toys "R" Us has recalled 27,000 crayon and paint sets made in China because the packaging of the wooden box contains lead, as does some of the watercolor paint within, company and government officials said Thursday.

No injuries have been reported from the use of the Imaginarium Wooden Coloring Cases, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Maybe it's time to buy toys made in the USA. Here's a list of toys that are still made in the USA and links to sites that only sell US manufactured toys.

Disgusting News of the Day: Used Chopsticks Sold as New

Ewwww! They're making it very hard for me to eat in Chinese restaurants:

A Beijing factory recycled used chopsticks and sold up to 100,000 pairs a day without any form of disinfection, a newspaper said on Wednesday, the latest is a string of food and product safety scares.

[...]

China, on track to overtake the United States this year as the world's second-largest exporter, lacks a basic food safety law and the manpower to enforce food and drug safety regulations at home or for export. Imports are generally carefully scrutinized.

A lack of business ethics and a spiritual vacuum after China embraced economic reforms in the late 1970s have been blamed for unscrupulous business practices and corruption.

(via)

Lawset to get Mattel to test kids for lead

Mattel should be offering to test these kids themselves, it shouldn't take a lawsuit to do it:

A family sued Mattel on Monday, claiming the world's largest toy maker should pay for testing to determine if children have been exposed to lead from millions of recalled toys.

I have no sympathy for a company that decides to cut expenses by doing business with communists. They are getting what they deserve. Maybe this will stop other businesses from doing it and we can stop funding China's future attacks against us.

China toy manufacturer commits suicide after Mattel recall

I wonder if it really was suicide:

When Mattel Inc. recalled nearly a million toys manufactured by Zhang Shuhong's company, he fought hard to find a way to resume sales to America. They were the lifeblood of his firm, Lee Der Industrial Co., Ltd., and its lucrative share of the export boom driving China's economic growth.

But as Zhang's factories in the southern city of Foshan lay idle, workers started drifting off, fearing they would never start up again. Then Chinese authorities sealed Zhang's ruin by announcing Thursday that he was prohibited from exporting toys until further notice because of the defects denounced by Mattel.

Zhang was found dead in a company warehouse two days later, colleagues said Monday, apparently having hanged himself in despair. His death dramatized the high stakes in an international scare over unsafe Chinese products and an increasingly vigorous government crackdown designed to restore confidence in the vital export industry.

"I think the company is about to go bankrupt," said an executive of a Lee Der subsidiary who identified himself only as Wang. "Otherwise, he wouldn't have committed suicide."

[...]

Factories churning out U.S.-bound products, which sprawl across Foshan and most of the rest of Guangdong province, have played a key role in providing employment for millions of farm youths. The Communist Party government has come to rely on them for maintaining not only employment but also the swift economic expansion that has transformed the lives of China's 1.3 billion inhabitants.

As a result, officials have reacted strongly to the reports of dangerous food and other products exported under the Made in China label. After an initial period seeking to play down the problem, they have repeatedly announced moves to strengthen supervision and increase cooperation with U.S. safety authorities. One sequence on official China Central Television news showed smartly uniformed food safety inspectors running out of their offices like firemen responding to an alarm.

It really makes you wonder how quick they would be to upset our economy. How many more suicides would they have if they lost America as a manufacturing partner and market?

AFL-CIO Debate: Kucinich on China

Kucinich states that we should never have made them a favored nation and I agree with him (shocking that I agree with him on anything but he's right on this).

Would China use the "nuclear option?"

I wonder if China would actually shoot itself in the foot like that? Do they think that they can take us down and leave themselves unscathed? Who do they think will be buying their products if they devalue the dollar? What about the US companies that have moved their operations over there? Their biggest problem right now is employment, they have to keep control of their population with jobs. Do they really want to risk open rebellion when their population starts losing their manufacturing jobs when their market starts drying up? A hit on our economy would have global implications, we would not go down alone, the world would join us in our economic collapse.

The Chinese government has begun a concerted campaign of economic threats against the United States, hinting that it may liquidate its vast holding of US treasuries if Washington imposes trade sanctions to force a yuan revaluation.

Two officials at leading Communist Party bodies have given interviews in recent days warning - for the first time - that Beijing may use its $1.33 trillion (£658bn) of foreign reserves as a political weapon to counter pressure from the US Congress.

Shifts in Chinese policy are often announced through key think tanks and academies.

Described as China's "nuclear option" in the state media, such action could trigger a dollar crash at a time when the US currency is already breaking down through historic support levels.

It would also cause a spike in US bond yields, hammering the US housing market and perhaps tipping the economy into recession. It is estimated that China holds over $900bn in a mix of US bonds.

Xia Bin, finance chief at the Development Research Centre (which has cabinet rank), kicked off what now appears to be government policy with a comment last week that Beijing's foreign reserves should be used as a "bargaining chip" in talks with the US.

"Of course, China doesn't want any undesirable phenomenon in the global financial order," he added.

[...]

A bill drafted by a group of US senators, and backed by the Senate Finance Committee, calls for trade tariffs against Chinese goods as retaliation for alleged currency manipulation.

(via)

Mattel recalls $30 million worth of toys

Can't feel too sorry for Mattel since the brought it on themselves. Manufactures who are looking to save money by dealing with China might want to keep in mind that China is doesn't hold to the same standards that we do.

Mattel Inc. said on Thursday it expects the recall of Chinese-made toys, such as popular preschool characters like Sesame Street's Elmo and Big Bird, to result in a charge of $30 million.

The estimate comes a day after the No. 1 toymaker recalled 1.5 million toys that were made by a contract manufacturer in China for the company's Fisher-Price unit. Shares fell 8.7 percent in early electronic trading.

They were recalled because their non-approved paint may contain too much lead -- linked to health problems, including brain damage, in children.

Representatives from Mattel were not immediately available for further comment.

Of the 1 million products recalled from the U.S. market, Mattel said about 30 percent reached store shelves.

[...]

Mattel is also expanding its testing programs to ensure that painted toys from third-party manufacturers are safe before being sent to customers.

What makes this worse is that as toddler toys you know they'll be put in the mouth.

Tags: manufacturing

China solves their rat problem by serving it in restaurants

Ewwwwww!

Live rats are being trucked from central China, suffering a plague of a reported 2 billion rodents displaced by a flooded lake, to the south to end up in restaurant dishes, Chinese media reported.

Rats had been doing a roaring trade thanks to strong supply over the last two weeks, the China News Service quoted vendors as saying.

"Recently there have been a lot of rats... Guangzhou people are rich and like to eat exotic things, so business is very good," it quoted a vendor as saying, referring to the capital of Guangdong province, where people are reputed to eat anything that moves.

(via)

Tags: rats

Chinese officials break "one-child" policy

Some are more equal than others, I guess:

Nearly 2,000 officials in central China have violated the nation's "one child" family planning policy, further revealing difficulties in implementing population controls.

Family planning departments have exposed 1,968 officials in populous Hunan province who have breached the law, Xinhua news agency said Sunday.

One "national" level official surnamed Li even went so far as to sire four children with his four different mistresses, the report said.

The local family planning commission caught 21 national and local legislators, 24 political advisers and 112 businessmen violating the birth control policies in the province that boasts a population of 66 million.

[...]

Generally, urban families can have one child and rural families can have two if the first is a girl.

But in recent years the policy has been routinely ignored in rural areas, while the newly rich in Chinese cities have opted to pay fines and suffer social penalties in order to have more than one child.

[...]

"However, there have been increasing reports of officials, tycoons and entertainment stars having more than one child, causing grave public concern."

This is why the pampered elites in our country don't have a problem adopting communism, nothing would change for them. They would be above the law just as officials and the rich are above the law in China.

Communism is a system that works counter to the nature man. Man is basically self-centered but communism calls for man to go against his nature for the greater good. Man really can't do that and wants more than everyone else. There is no true equality because those in power will inevitably take advantage of the system for their own comfort.

Manufacturing Cities in China

If you haven't seen the pictures of the manufacturing cities of China at Wired News, go look at them. They're amazing! The sheer volume of the workforce in China is overwhelming. It's no wonder we can't compete.

Since they have no environmental laws, workforce requirements and no concern about the products they produce they will be able to be the manufacturer of the world.

"Taiwan said 'we're going to become the semi-conductor manufacturer for the world' and now they ultimately produce 50 percent of the world's semi-conductors; Japan said we're going to make cars and electronics and they've become dominant in the world in those two fields.

The difference with China is that they have no such strategy, they're just saying 'wherever there's money, we're going to do it.' They produce 90 percent of the world's Christmas ornaments and they're not Christians, they don't even know what they're for or what they represent, but they make them because we buy them. They don't care what they're making as long as we buy it."

Maybe American companies should figure out a way to market quality over quantity. I bet they will find people like me who are willing to pay more for a better product. Unfortunately, I can't find products made in America to buy. I deliberately set out to buy a handbag made in America a few years ago and had a very hard time. I finally bought a Stone Mountain, paying double what I could have paid just because it wasn't made in China.

Tags: manufacturing