China's reaction to last night's debate

The Xinhua News Agency, official press agency of China, has interesting observations and opinions about our Presidential Election and the candidates' views.

"In the last of three rounds of U.S. presidential debate, both candidates framed China

as a partner for the first time, offering a speck of belated comfort as the country had

been portrayed as a monetary cheat and a job thief in their previous face-offs."

"A few relieving words, however, are quickly overshadowed by traditional campaign tricks

of scapegoating and ill-grounded hypotheses. The U.S. president-in-waiting, no matter

who is elected, lacks deep understanding of how partners should treat each other."

Just exactly how should trading partners treat each other? Currency manipulation, trademark/copyright law violations and various other unfair trade practices seem to be of no concern on that side of the water, so maybe they think we should be engaging the same? Is tit-for-tat part of our deep understanding deficiency?

"Both candidates vowed to 'make China feel pressured to play by rules.'

But they should know that rules have never been built upon pressure,

but candid talks and concessions taking mutual benefits into account."

Haven't we been working at having candid talks with these folks? What concessions have we not made?

Dealing with Communists has never been America's forte'. We always have this problem with our concern for our Constitution and our understanding of Free Enterprise. Communists don't.

Hunter S. Thompson said it

Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of

arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body,

but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke,

thoroughly used up, totally worn out,

and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!

 

A man who knows something about business and job creation

Yes, BO, he built it.

This is from the YouTube page...
"Home Depot Founder Bernie Marcus shares his concerns for our nation and how frightened he is by what Pres. Obama's policies mean for America, especially for our children and future generations. In particular, the lack of job creation and rising home foreclosures are limiting the American dream for millions of families.

As someone who has taken Home Depot from one store to one of the largest companies in the world, and as someone who has hired millions of people over many years in business, Bernie is in a unique position to know which policies can bring about economic growth and prosperity and how badly Pres. Obama's policies are hurting us."

Brothers can be mean sometimes

This came from one of my favorite blogs.

If you're not active or ex-military, you may not get it (the joke)

I find 'em. You read 'em. Or not.

You've heard about all the union leaders and their access to the White House. Now this... A Red Carpet for Radicals at the White House and those radicals are Islamists!

 Rules? What rules? We don't need no steenking rules! Your tax $$$ and financing political events

Surprise, Surprise... Obama spokeswoman: Big Bird, binders ‘important’ in this election

And what were the school chirrun doing in the meantime?... Minnesota teachers take two days to play with dolls and study Islam

From our "friends" at the UN... Romney win would mean a democratic mandate for torture

Did The Prez mis-spoke? Again?... Putting Obama's "Mammogram Lie" to the Test

A drone was over the Benghazi Consulate during the attack? We may have had special troops only an hour away?... How to Abandon Our Bravest Citizens in a War Zone

It's those black rocks we have trainload after trainload of, moving across the US every day... In the War on Coal -- It's Grundy vs. Obama

It's not always good to be a seismologist

Seismology is the science of studying earthquakes. And tremors, and aftershocks and everything else connected with earthquakes. I guess it's a nice, interesting job. Maybe even a tad laid back. Except when a disaster is involved. Like every other natural disaster, quakes can get pretty gruesome.

Seismologists don't just sit around waiting for Mother Nature to do some shaking. Or a whole lot of shaking. They work on predicting when one could possibly, or is about to, occur. They don't like to make predictions that carry a high level of certainty. You shouldn't try and fool Mother, and you damned sure better be careful when you say you know when she's about to do one of her "things."

In April 2009, there was a quake in Italy and 300+ folks died. Investigations ensued, of course. And one of those investigations was aimed at Italian seismologists.

"When the charges were brought against the Italian scientists back in 2010, they shocked

the scientific world. Prosecutors claimed that the scientists, while serving on a government

panel, minimized the potential risks of a potential quake in the region, and gave "incomplete,

imprecise, and contradictory information" to the area's citizens, according to an in-depth

report on the case last year in the scientific journal Nature."

Those six scientists were convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to prison. They were found guilty of  failing to adequately warn the city of L'Aquila in advance of he quake.

As much as many of us would like to "convict" our local weather forecasters, we don't. It's just a silly idea. Now I'm wondering how many US bottom feeders lawyers are mulling over the possibility.

At one time we had secrets. Now there are Secrets and "Secrets"

First, the ground rules...
The word Secret can be used as a noun or an adjective. For my purpose, it's one of three levels of security assigned to information or material (stuff). The other two are Confidential and Top Secret.

Secret information is: documents, pictures, charts or anything else associated with a piece of equipment, project, proposal... any and everything you only want folks with "A Need to Know," to know. Clear?

Disclosure of Secret information has the potential of causing serious damage to our national security. (Sadly, sometimes it's just embarrassing if folks find out about it.) Access to Secret information in only given to folks considered trustworthy. (And we all know how that occasionally works out.)

Now (finally) a couple of my Pet Peeves...
There are politicians, and those associated with them, who use classified information for their own purpose(s). They "leak" information to someone they know who will, in turn, pass it along or publish it. These politicians were granted a security clearance because they were deemed to be worthy of trust. Evidently they are not.

Today I found an example of "Secrets" (Secrets that aren't really.) The US has an unmanned (for now), reusable craft designated X-37B. It's launched into space, does its job(s) and then re-enters the atmosphere and lands. Rinse and repeat.

The story, titled, get this now, "Mysterious X-37B Military Space Plane's Next Secret Mission Delayed" Ok, it's not mysterious, and the next planned launch in not secret. What it'll do when/if it gets in orbit is another Secret, or not. Its exact capabilities have been widely speculated, and a few revealed.

If you'd like some idea about the design, Google you this... "X-37B diagrams" or "X-37B design" or "X-37B capabilities" or just about anything else you want to know about the X-37B. Lots of dots to connect, folks.

The fact that it even exists, IMO, should not be public knowledge. Much less how it works, its capabilities and when we launch or delay launching the damned thing! But the information is all over the internet and shows up from time to time on the evening news. Lord love a duck.

During the "Cold War," (I use the "  " because it wasn't as cold as most think. Another story for another day.) the Russian Commies pulled off one of the greatest "disinformation" cons ever. The US believed their planted information about the capabilities of one of their bombers. And we acted accordingly on that (dis)information.

Is the X-37B actually a masterful piece of disinformation? Are we just giving Russia, China, Iran, N. Korea, et al, a wild goose to chase? I don't think so.

The "October non-Surprise" was just announced

The post I wrote yesterday just took a new turn. Turns out The Prez has been secretly arranging for a sit-down with Achma-whatshisname. The Iranian nut job. About their "peaceful" nuclear project(s). But, since these things take time, it won't/can't happen until after the elections. Funny how these things work.

This story comes from some one over in that neighborhood. Interesting view point.

BenghaziGate keeps on keepin' on

A few quotes from a story I just read...

"No one from the FBI has interviewed him. Libyan security forces haven’t brought him in

for questioning. But one of the leading suspects behind last month’s bloody assault on the

U.S. consulate in Benghazi just gave a boastful interview to The New York Times, all while

comfortably sipping a strawberry frappe and trying to convert the reporter to Islam.

Comments like these help explain why the CIA wants to expand the drone war."

"Abu Khattala is obviously not feeling pressure from the manhunt that Obama

administration officials have portrayed as underway."

"Yet Abu Khattala met with the Times’ David Kirkpatrick at a “luxury hotel” in eastern Libyan

city for “two leisurely hours,” and did everything but laugh openly at Obama’s pledge.

Abu Khattala doesn’t plan to go into hiding."

And some folks actually approve of our current Foreign Policy!