Post To The Left

While China doesn't have a monopoly on Rare Earths the media sure seems to think it does. Recently China has started restricting Rare Earth exports which has the media abuzz about Japan and Germany protests. Is this all media hype or are Rare Earth supply the next resource to start wars over?

I wonder how much NASA has been involved in monitoring this event. They spend millions to create an atmosphere where humans are kept together in a small space for long periods to test future long distance space travel and then BOOM they have this fall on their lap. A free social experiment with a random assortment of people, all the while its in the DARK!

So terrorists are those groups who threaten Canada? Like the Sikhs who blew up the Canadian plane? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India_Flight_182

Have you actually gone through this page? 85% seems a little high. True Islamic terrorists have stepped up their attacks recently but the number of suicide attacks between 1980-2000 are as stands: 168 The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka and in India 52 Hizbullah and pro-Syrian groups in Lebanon, Kuwait and Argentina 22 Hamas in Israel 15 The Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK) in Turkey 8 The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in Israel 2 Al-Qaida in East Africa 1 The Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) in Croatia 1 The Islamic Group (IG) in Pakistan 1 Barbar Khalsa International (BKI) in India 1 The Armed Islamic Group (GIA) in Algeria Tamil Tigers far outpaced any Muslim group. And I haven't really gone through the wiki page but just scanning it appears a lot of the 80s was dominated by communist groups in Europe, Christian groups in Lebanon and American sponsored terror groups in South America.

Well right off the bat: Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda. They are a Christian Fundamentalist terrorist group that wants to set up theocracy in Uganda ruled by the Christian Bible and the Ten Commandments. Then we can talk about the Jewish terrorist groups in Israel. They used to kidnap British soldiers, hold them for randsom, murder them and then bobby trap their bodies in hopes of killing more innocent lives. Of course the IRA, the anti-abortion terror attacks, Ku Klux Klan, etc, etc

Ahhh so as it stands now America has 14 Trillion US dollars debt so if rapid inflation takes place and a loaf of bread is 2 billion US dollars then America can pay off all its debt for the same amount as buying a new TV. Except sure the American debt is paid off but everyone who has savings in American dollars have wiped out their saving and now have useless dollars.

So a loaf of bread costing $US 2 billion dollars is a good thing? ....how does that help with America's massive debts?

UK never paid its World War I debts and it's all well and good for America to have a law that says they can't default but if they don't have the money what can they do. If I understand you correctly you're saying they can just print more money. Isn't that what lead Germany, Zimbabwe to have runaway inflation as in a loaf of bread costing 2 billion dollars? /not an economist

Germany is making the final payments on its Versailles Treaty Reparations. The 1932 Lausanne Conference was supposed to cancel out reparations but the Americans never passed it through their Congress. After World War II West Germany signed the 1953 London Treaty which said that it would settle the war reparations after the country became reunified. In 1990 they started making payments again finally settling the reparations this Sunday. This brings up an interesting point as the United Kingdom and many of the victor nations that won World War I HAVEN'T paid their World War I debts to America off. After the Wall Street crash in 1933 President Hoover called for a temporary halt of payments to get the World economy going again. Then that whole World War II thing happened and the UK and most other nations just abandoned (Finland was the only to continue making payments ... suckers) It makes me wonder as when the American's can't pay off its incredible debt in the future why won't they just follow the United Kingdom's example and just refuse to pay?

Defectors from North Korea have talked about coups happening before: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/north-korea-coup-fuels-security-fears-defectors-story-of-failed-military-takeover-adds-to-speculation-over-pyongyangs-regional-ambitions-1463444.html http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/8367395.stm So it's not totally impossible. That said, I'm sure whatever elements tried to take over, their families and anyone remotely connected to them have been liquidated.

Wait what? Taking things out of context contest! Sweet! Nazi Jewish Gestapo Israeli neo-Nazi gang Ohhh snap!

Very good point. But how do they live with themselves? Taiwanese, South Korean dictators could justify their corrupt, oppressive rule to their countries and maybe even to themselves because they were fighting communism. But regimes like Myanmar and North Korea where they know of the outside world and how their countries suck but they hang on to power ... for the sake enriching themselves and hanging on to power at the expense of their own people!

Good point and her husband is supposedly powerful within the regime and buddy buddy with Kim Jong-Il. So its not really the son that is next in line but a combination of the son and his Aunt and Uncle (Kim Jong-Il's sister and brother-in-law) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11297747

He was anything but a fine gentleman but he was anything but religious. Saddam didn't use WMD because he feared Israeli retaliation. That is why an attack on Israel by another State is so such a low threat. Israel has the most powerful military in the region and combined with its nuclear weapons no State would ever dare a WMD attack.

Saddam was never a true believer and he never used WMDs in his scuds (when he could have) just conventional weapons.

Why would America nuke Iran when Israel has its own nukes and delivery systems? Not to mention why would Iran nuke Israel when any nuke would make a large part of Israel radioactive. A northern strike would create fallout over Lebanon and Iran's southern Lebanonese allies, Hezbollah. A central strike would harm those parts that are most holy to Muslims. A southern strike would make Gaza even more an unlivable space.

The American military is the same. From Defence Donald Rumsfeld's staff putting Bible verses on the top of the military "Worldwide Intelligence Update" briefings, the discrimination of Atheist soldiers, the proselytizing to the local Afghans by American military chaplains in Muslim Afghanistan, to the incredible influence the born again movement has in the American Military.

In Pyongyang on 28 September there will be a conference of the WPK [Workers Party of Korea] for electing its supreme leadership. The last time this conference was held was decades ago when Kim Jong-il was announced to be the next in succession. It is thought that the Dynastic communist regime will appoint Jung's son Kim Jong-un as the next leader. In true form to this hermit kingdom almost NOTHING is known about his son including his age (maybe 26 or 27). But there are reports he spent time at a boarding school in Switzerland. How could anyone who lived for anytime in Switzerland continue the total incompetence of the North Korean State that has killed millions? If the next generation does come to power how will he change the State?

The retention rate of Children of ultra-Orthodox parents is quite high due to the total seclusion of Orthodox Jews from Israeli society. Closed ultra-orthodox areas were formed after Israel was created because their immigrant residents wanted to preserve their traditional way of life. Those few who have escaped Fundamentalist Judaism have had a tough go. According to this BBC report one "Rabbi Noson Weisz has only known four or five cases of people leaving in three decades of work."

There is no way you can be taken seriously and claim that the colonization and rule of the American colonies was the same as the brutal oppression and stagnation caused by the colonization of Britain's Empire. At one point India made a third of the world's products when the British took control they suppressed all enterprise so that instead of Indian industry producing for Indian consumers, the Indians would have to buy products from Britain. This happened all over the Empire including the Arab nations. When Arab nations finally did gain independence they were left with Arab leaders following a socialist agenda that also suppressed enterprise and innovation. So back to my point you can't compare Arab Oil Nations and Israel. You could however compare individual Arabs living in a similar democratic and free environment as Israel and from them you can see that Arab innovation is on par with Israel.

That for Israeli society as a whole it means big trouble. Just look at these headlines: Israel Prosperity Seen Unsustainable as Haredim Refuse to Work 70% of ultra-Orthodox men don't work Israel At Risk Of Collapse Due To Its Own Welfare State Crisis The very nature of a large segment of the population refusing to work and then demanding the rest of the country to defend them is very troubling. This is combined with their high birth rate which will means in the next few generation the majority of Israelis will be orthodox Jews who refuse to do anything but study scripture. Then you combine that with the Israeli government. The very nature of the Israeli political system is that the small parties are the King makers and hold the power. The mainstream movements can't form a government on their own so rely on the small fringe parties such as Shas to hold power. This ensures that Israel will never do anything about their welfare state. But the scary thing is they want to make Israel a theocracy, turn back the clock on a free Israel. Already there are calls for the separation of the sexes (like banning of women from the western wall), turning away from technology, religious controls in all aspects of society. The Haredi sect has already launched a morality police similar to Saudi Arabia. These religious police prowl through Israel seeking violators of a growing list of rabbinical laws such as the recent decree banning the sale of MP4 players.

I'm sure this was the case at some point. What do you think about this large segment of the population that strives to kill innovation, entrepreneurial spirit while siting in their homes studying the holy books and collecting welfare? Bloomberg.com thinks the state of Israel is under threat because of its status as a welfare state do you disagree with that?

Israel is not a economically self-sufficient nation, only with charity raised overseas and large influxes of foreign government cash (Mostly from America) can the nation survive. Israel and the Israeli's themselves survive mostly off charity of others, a true welfare state. Without this assistance it would surely collapse, but what weighs the state down? What hobbles its progress? One factor is the second fastest-growing population of Israel is Israel’s ultra-Orthodox population. A country where the birth rate is dropping should welcome this new expanding Jewish segment yet they refuse to work, and fight in the army. 60% to 70% of fundamentalist Jews prefer to leach off the state because their rabbis told them to stay at home, study the bible and make babies (Orthodox families have upwards of 10 children) while the wife works whatever part-time job she can while living on the dole. Will Israel be able to limp along with this ball and chain where a large segment of their population refuse to work? The Orthodox themselves say that secular Israelis should work while they take their money to pray providing a so called "spiritual service" to the nation. But should secular Israelis pay that price? The orthodox community ,of which 70% don't work, quickly grow raising the amount of money to support them (Not to mention more secular Jews will have to join the army to protect the non-serving Orthodox population) while at the same time they make more and more demands to turn Israel into an theocratic state.

A "medieval culture" in a time when Europe was light years behind them.

So the glory of Ottoman Empire once the leader of the world in math, science, warfare and medicine doesn't count?